Escape Plan 145b
by SilverSpiderArt
Summary: Pre-Movie, AU-ish: Injured after his latest battle with Metro Man, Megamind is returned to prison where he finds that the Warden has changed the rules. This is a rework of my one-shot "Solitary" into a full multi-chapter fic.
1. Chapter 1 (152 hours)

My head cannon and ideas about Megamind are very strongly inspired by the excellent authors, Dal Niente, Dani Kin, and Ladyspock7. So, credit where it's due. They are awesome, go read their stuff.

I hope you have as much fun reading this as I did writing it.

 **I don't own Megamind**

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Metro City Prison for the Criminally Gifted

 _4:02pm Friday, January 25th_

The blue alien slouched down in the chair bolted in the center of the round cell. Scowling Megamind realized he's missed most of the re-cap of today's events. On the small television mounted on the wall near the ceiling, live footage of the crater left at the shipping docks was playing.

"As you can see firefighters are currently on the scene to battle the blaze trying to spread to the nearby pier. I have confirmation that thanks once again to the valiant efforts of our city's beloved Metro Man, no lives were lost. We do again, urge citizens to keep their distance. While the villainous Megamind is safely behind bars for now, his machines are still active in the area," The reporter, a blond man with a clean shaven young face, gestured behind himself where Brain Bots could be seen, "We are told specialty crews will be along shortly to assist Metro Man with making the area safe for our city's fair citizens once more."

His beloved cyborgs would be salvaging all the sensitive and dangerous equipment from the remains of Megamind's latest failure. They'd be done soon and clear out long before this so called _specialty crew_ ever showed up.

It bothered him, though, that Roxanne wasn't doing the reporting.

Did he miss her piece already? He snorted; she probable had just covered the Metro Man interview before going off with her _boyfriend_ to cuddle and drink cocoa or whatever couples did. Not that Megamind could blame her; it had been a rough day.

He brought a long fingered blue hand up to rub at his face, the super glue holding his cuts closed really itched. Wincing, he gingerly traced the cut on his lip and the swelling on his right cheekbone, a cracked orbital. He dropped his hand to his bruised ribs; add a twisted ankle that was twice the size it should be, and his entire right side and both hands covered in lacerations. Even accounting for accelerated healing the sheer extent of these injuries meant that healing would take time. Everything ached and stung, which combined with the glue and bandage wraps, left him feeling wrung out and uncomfortable.

He'd have to extend his stay longer than originally planned before implementing escape plan 145b. A week at most, but it was still frustrating. He hadn't planned on being here for more than 4 days; especially after what happened last time.

He glanced back up to the television as the report moved back to the station and the anchorman took over. Definitely missed Roxanne's bit. He shouldn't be surprised; the doctor took longer fussing over his injuries than normal. It had taken him ages to convince the man he didn't have a concussion.

Sighing he pushed the chair back into a more reclined position, half transformed into its bed shape, and let the weariness take over. He's exhausted, only having managed to work in a few hours of sleep before the battle. He needs less sleep then humans, but he should sleep more often.

Not that he does.

He could almost hear Minion whispering "Finally!" as Megamind let his eyes drift shut. He's too sore to really sleep though, it's impossible to find a position that didn't put pressure on his damaged ribs. So he just let his mind wander, the sound of the news in the background becoming a comforting murmur.

The plan had seemed so promising. Luring Metro Man to Lake Michigan's icy shores then dragging him under, it was genius really. Despite the hero's numerous invulnerablies, the other alien still needed to breath. Megamind had learned from other encounters that while Metro Man had an incredible high tolerance for heat, he was far more susceptible to cold. While Megamind doubted the plunge into the icy depth of Lake Michigan alone would have killed Mr. Goody-Two-Shoes, the freezing temperatures should have slowed his reaction time down considerably.

Not that anything went as planned.

Still, looking over the footage and data recordings captured by his Brain Bots should give him valuable feedback to use towards future evil plans.

He just had to keep reminding himself to look on the bright side.

There had been nothing inherently wrong with his plan; it was hardly _his_ fault that a freak ice storm blew in overnight. This was Michigan after all and as anyone who's lived in Michigan knows, the weather was always fickle and winter was a cold, hard, unforgiving bitch. So it could hardly be said that his plan _failed_ it was just that he'd been incredibly unlucky.

Which was pretty much normal.

No, no that was just the pessimism talking again. He could hear Minion chiding him, he mustn't think like that.

The plan had been sound, mostly.

He just had to be better prepared to deal with ice in the future. Better insulation for the Brain Bots to keep their ACS Fluid from freezing and causing them to shut down or maybe just changing the compound to lower its freezing point. He really should be writing this down so he doesn't forget.

Opening his eyes he started to sit up before remembering he wasn't at Evil Lair and that the Warden had long ago revoked his right to hanging up ideas in his cell. Not that he'd want the prison officers on guard to be able to see what he was planning anyway, the swine.

Collapsing back into the chair he closed his eyes again and prepared to use a mental trick he'd developed for just such occasions. It's not as good as actually being able to add the note to his idea cloud, but he'd remedy that as soon as he was free again.

Focusing, he imagined his drafting table spread out before him.

He sat before it on a metal stool. The image was still blurry, though. More details, then. There would be a blueprint, what was he working on last? The new generator, yes that sounded right, the blueprint spread itself out on the desk before him. Mentally he ran his fingers over the paper as the careful pencil marks filled themselves in: scale drawing of the inner workings, parts list, equations, aesthetic sketch of its overall design, notes on fuel ratios, and a small sketch of a bird that had flown into the Lair in the corner.

Megamind breathed evenly holding the image in his mind. He could attach his note to this. Carefully he reached out, there would be drafting pencils and markers all around the table. He needed something specific, though. A red marker appeared before him, its cap dented from where it was crewed on by Brain Bot number 12. That'd work. He took a yellow note card from the pile that was always at the desk and quickly wrote out 'lower freeze point for artificial cerebrospinal fluid'. Tapping the marker against his chin, after a moment's thought he added, 'specialized winter team?'

Tossing the marker on the table where it blurred out of existence, he jumped up on the stool, card in hand. Hundreds of cards floated around him on their strings, just out of focus. Megamind reached out brushing them with his fingertips. Finally he found the card he was looking for, a note from Minion about a fur lined winter cape, there was a grease smudge on the back side. He hardly thought that he'd look intimidating covered with fur, but after shivering through the entirety of this afternoon's battle he was willing to concede that Minion had a point.

With a bit of concentration a new red string appeared beside the fur cape card, its length allowing it to fall just below and to the left. Clipping the Brain Bot ACSF note in place, Megamind jumped down from the stool and allowed himself to relax, still breathing evenly, locking everything in his memory.

He could hear footsteps outside.

Letting the last of the image fade away, he opened his eyes and sat back up in his chair. It was the only piece of furniture in the room, a special design that he'd been allowed to submit. They'd left off most of the features he'd wanted of course, but in the end the Warden had allowed it to be built as it was far better suited to the blue alien's needs then the standard prison furniture. He was grateful for that, though he'd never admit it.

Kicking off the floor Megamind spun the chair around to face the door and got into character; a casual smirk, his long fingers steepled before him.

5:30pm meant dinner time.

"About time!" the blue man quipped, chin raised, "I thought I'd waste away before you came and got me. Though knowing the drivel you call food, I may just starve regardless."

The correctional officer looking through the open viewing window in the cell's door was anything but amused. A new recruit to Megamind's security detail determined to prove himself by keeping the notorious super villain behind bars then. What fun.

"You know the drill, Megamind. Against the wall, hands and feet spread." Very no nonsense, the Warden certainly knew how to pick them.

"Oh you're going to be fun." Megamind pitched his voice in a sing song manner, trying his best to hide the flash of pain that shot through the right side of his face when he tried lifting his eyebrows. He's sure the expression didn't look right with how swollen his eye must be.

This was not the time to be second guessing himself.

He rolled off the chair, all elbows and knees. He'd meant it to be a graceful movement, to intimidate the new officer. It's anything but. His left ankle immediately gave out, forcing him to catch himself on the chair. His ribs ached, throbbing in time with his heart that was suddenly pounding far too fast. The room spun.

Breathe.

Megamind gasped, fire shooting through his chest, and quickly tried to cover his stumble. Never show weakness. He used the fact that his back was to the door to hide his grimace of pain and forced himself upright. Striding to the wall and assuming the position, arms shoulder high with his hands flat against the wall and his feet spread; he desperately tried to will the trembling from his left leg.

Behind him the door opened.

Megamind tensed. The air moved around the cell as the officers entered, the circular shape adding to the ease of circulation. Even being prepared, it was a punch to the gut, his skin tingled. There were three of them, they were following procedure. One took up position at the door, he'd have his Taser out; a mix of fear and determination rolled off him. Another newbie, the fear wouldn't show on the Cowboy's face, but to Megamind he might as well have been shouting it to the world.

"Stay where you are," Mr. No-Nonsense warned, "you move and you're tased."

He stepped into the room, bringing with him a feeling of weariness and caution. The third correctional officer, who felt more amused then anything, stayed outside the door, the rear guard. He must be a veteran to Megamind's detail then, for him to be so nonchalant.

Now Mr. No-Nonsense would cuff Megamind, ankles and wrists in a 4-piece. He'd be taken out of his cell with Nonchalant leading, Mr. No-Nonsense holding his chain, and Fraidy-Cat Cowboy with the Taser in the rear. They'd march him down to the mess hall and he'd be able to catch up on the latest goings-on in the prison. He only ever got to eat with the Maximum Security Block these days, but he still had a few Uncles in their ranks.

Megamind smiled at the thought of Uncle Tony's gruff laugh and the hearty slap on the back he'd get, even if it did mean setting off his sore ribs again.

Behind him he heard a soft sound, but no clank of metal that would mean the irons they'd be binding him with. This wasn't going as expected. Mr. No-Nonsense hadn't come any closer and now was backing up? Upon hearing the door slide close Megamind whipped his head around.

"What trickery is this?"

A tray of food sat on his chair, a cardboard tray and no silverware.

"It's already 5:33, I'm supposed to be eating with the others!" Megamind shouted indignantly, turning fully, arms crossed.

That was a mistake; his ankle protested the rough treatment causing him to stumble. He managed to hold his glare however, teeth clenched.

"New orders, kid," Nonchalant drawled, now that Megamind heard his voice he placed him as Hank Johnson who was into his fourth year guarding Megamind. "Warden says you gotta stay in yer cell till further notice."

"What? Why‽"

Solitary confinement, what in the world could the Warden be thinking? It couldn't just be due to his injuries, he'd suffered worse and still been allowed to mingle with his fellow inmates. Nothing else was overly different about his latest duel with Metrocity's hero to cause any change to the routine.

"Orders are orders," Hank replied, a shrug in his voice. He must be sitting at the guard desk as Megamind couldn't see him.

Mr. No-Nonsense glared through the view port and Megamind was glad he was just left with the lingering odors of fear and weariness in his cell, though he still got a bare whiff of frustrated anger.

"Not your place to question orders, prisoner," the man snapped, "You're to trash the tray when you're done."

With that Mr. No-Nonsense turned and left, Megamind could just see Fraidy-Cat Cowboy trailing behind. Ignoring the food for now, he approached the door favoring his twisted ankle. Leaning against the door to see better, Megamind peered out trying to get a glimpse of Nonchalant Hank.

"Hey, Hank, what gives?"

"Just orders, kid," Hank grunted in reply, Megamind can only see his feet which were now propped up on the desk. "You'd hafta ask the boss man."

"I am **not** a child anymore, you'd do well to show respect," Megamind snarled, pain and the change in routine leaving him snappish.

"Yeah, yeah, 23, I heard. Still a kid ta me," a brief flash of the man's hand being waved dismissively.

"Insolent swine" the young blue alien grumbled.

Sulking Megamind turned his back to the door and limped over to the chair. The tray really was just disposable cardboard; it seemed they didn't want to repeat their entry routine to retrieve a plastic one later. Dinner appeared to consist of an apple, some sort of misshapen meat substance, what he could only pray were mashed potatoes, a few slices of toasted bread, and a boxed drink that was most likely juice.

"What am I supposed to eat this with, Hank? You've conveniently forgotten the spork." Megamind glared back over his shoulder at the spot in the wall where Mr. I-Don't-Care Hank sat.

"Dunno, weren't told nothing 'bout silverware."

Megamind rubbed his impressively large forehead in frustration. "Every inmate at **least** gets a plastic spork," he ground out, "What I suppose to do, eat with my hands like some animal?"

"Suppose so."

Bone headed numbskull, this was ridiculous. Moving the tray so he could sit, Megamind noticed that there was a bit of folded paper tucked next to the apple. Plucking it from the tray he examined it; if folded a certain way with the sides up it formed something like a spoon.

"You've got to be kidding me."

He wasn't even to be trusted with silverware now? This was incredulous. With a long suffering sigh he poked at his _meal_ with his _spoon_ and turned back to the television. They were finally re-airing his epic battle. Well lackluster, if he was being honest with himself, though the explosion at the end did give it a decent climax.

"-clusive footage of the battle where our own channel 8 star reporter, Roxanne Ritchi, was being held hostage be the super villain Megamind."

The screen cut away from the studio to their recording of his hacked broadcast. He danced before the camera, his only concession to the weather being thicker leather and the collar on his mantle framing more closely to his large bald dome to keep out the winter chill. He had looked dastardly, though he'd been frozen to the bone before they'd even gotten started. In the recording he jumped around wildly; looking at it now it was painfully obvious he was just trying to keep the blood flowing in his limbs.

Forgoing the ridiculous paper spoon, he scooped up some of the mashed potatoes with the toast and begun eating methodically. Tasteless and bland, to think that he once thought that all food was like this.

The footage advanced to him calling out Metro Man to "Brave the icy winds of defeat for this day justice will certainly be blinded by the blizzard white out of evil!" Not his best line. They cut to a helicopter crews shot of the abandoned freight dock he'd prepared for the battle, zooming in on the crane platform and Miss Ritchi. She was hunched with her shoulders drawn to her ears which were red with cold, wrapped in black cloth and tied with rope to a metal beam. The wind had been really blowing at that point, the freezing gust pulling at her long hair which had fallen out of the professional bun. He was relieved to see that the heated blanket Minion had used wasn't recognizable as such from that distance. It really would have detracted from the whole effect of imperilment.

She looked so cold up there though.

Guiltily he paused, a scoop of mash half way to his mouth. It had been so much colder than the weather report had predicted. It wasn't _his_ fault, the plans were already in motion; he could hardly cancel for something as meaningless as a few degree drop in temperature. That would have been appallingly amateurish.

But getting his frozen ass knocked through a snowbank into a brick wall wasn't? He thumped his head on the back rest of the chair, relishing the blossoming pain. _Masochist_ , he thought bitterly.

A roar of metal and sloshing ice sounded from the tinny television speakers signaling that his mechanized creation had appeared on screen. "I-it appears to be some kind of robotic fish!" the helicopter reporter shouted over the howling wind.

"Come on! Is it that hard to tell it's a whale? Which is a mammal, you ignorant cretin. Who even let you on the air?" his fist thumped hard on the metal armrest, knuckles white against his blue skin.

Roxanne hadn't made such a mistake. No, she'd had a different criticism.

"Good job, genius. You do realize whales live in the ocean and this is a fresh water lake, right?" She's snarked through chattering teeth.

Of course he knew _that_ , but how could he pass up making a Killer Whale, the most vicious of water based killers in the Arctic. More than fitting imagery to match Lake Michigan's frozen coast covered in shelf ice. It was a _Killer_ Whale for crying out loud, how could he not build one? Ridiculous woman. He started shoveling food into his mouth again, scowling as the footage played.

Oh, that was where he slipped and fumbled the controls. He couldn't even feel his fingers any more by that point. He'd been trying earlier, when he realized just how much ice had coated the dock, to have the Brain Bots chip it off. There just hadn't been enough time. He had to keep rotating them out in shifts when their fluids started freezing, it made for painfully slow progress. As it was he feared 23 might have permanent tissue damage, it had been acting erratically by the end of the fight. Even Minion's heating unit had started to fail before Metro Man had even shown up and the ichthyoid ended up having to retreat into the dock's warehouse with the recovering Brain Bots.

What a fiasco the entire day had been.

The recording could barely pick up his and Mr. Cold-Fist-of-Justice's banter. Probable for the best, they'd both been really off their game. What had he even said? Something about Metro Man death coming to him like an iceberg in the night. _Like the Unsinkable Titanic mere frozen water shall prove to be your doom!_ He really shouldn't have let Minion talk him into watching that movie. Metro Man at least had gotten the references, though his banter has as cheesy as ever. Justice not being asleep behind the wheel, yada yada, enough life boat for all.

Now the part that really should have worked; Whaletor lunged out of the water and caught Metro Man in its jaws. Megamind sat forward eyes fixed to the screen. This was where he'd lost track of events. He hadn't even known anything had gone wrong until he'd heard the grinding and crash before his vision had been filled by a severed metal fin, than whiteness followed by pain and blackness.

Everything still seemed to be working. With Metro Man firmly held, the killer mechanoid had fallen backwards into the lake taking the hero with it. The shock of hitting the freezing water should have stunned and disoriented the invulnerable alien enough for the weight of the robot to drag them both down to the channels sandy depths.

Right, laser eyes, why does he always forget about the laser eyes? Likely because Mr. I'm-Too- Prefect rarely uses them for fear of the collateral damage. Twin red beams boil the water's surface and cover the battlefield in fog. Megamind couldn't really see what happened next, but it seemed the hero flung the giant killer robot haphazardly away from himself. It must have collided with part of the dock which had caused its power cell to become so unstable and also caused the shrapnel that had taken Megamind out.

There was Metro Man whisking Roxanne off the crane, oh and there went a month of hard work up into a ball of flame as Whaletor exploded. It really did make Metro Man look stunningly heroic, framed in the fiery plume, soaked white costume nearly translucent in places, and Roxanne clinging to his neck in relief. It just wasn't fair.

At least now he'd get to hear Roxanne's report of the event. He had begun to pick apart his apple as he waited for her to appear. Only she doesn't, it's that boyish blond that Megamind had seen reporting earlier. In the background of the shot he can see Roxanne being helped into a waiting ambulance. Crap. She must have suffered worse from the freezing temperatures than he had realized if they hadn't even let her even conduct a 5 minute interview with her rescuer. Way to go, genius.

The camera panned up then, showing Metro Man hauling a crumpled and bloody figure out of a snowbank. Oh, Megamind didn't need to be reminded of that particular humiliation. His cape and mantle were in taters and as Metro Man moved to hold him bridal style, cradling the smaller alien's large blue head; Megamind wasn't sure whether to be appalled or laugh. He looked horrible, his face nothing but bloody frozen hamburger. Transfixed on the screen, he traced the swelling about his right eye again. He suddenly felt immensely luck he hadn't suffered any vision loss; no wonder Dr. Zither had been so concerned when Metro Man had dropped him off. Megamind could only let out a strained chortle as he watched himself stir in Metro Man's arms, his own bloody hand weakly swatting at the hero's face, smearing it with blood. He covered his mouth with that hand now, cringing in embarrassment. Wayne had just been so…

Relieved?

Megamind wished he could remember what the other alien had said to him. He could only remember being quite cross with Wayne at the time. The large man had kept apologizing the entire way to the prison. Really it was entirely unprofessional, the nerve of some people, hardly befitting of a nemesis. As if Megamind hadn't just tried to drown the Prefect Bastard. Metro Man was just trying not to ruin his spotless image, of course, couldn't have a death on his hands. That would stain that pure white; like his blood had. Yeah, that was it.

The report continued to the point where Megamind had caught the broadcast the first time around. Sighing, he thumbed the remote, he needed a distraction. Continuing to agenized over all this wouldn't help in the slightest. It was only 7:38pm he still had another two hours and 22 minutes to kill before Lights Out.

Idly he'd begun flipping through channels, the remains of his dinner mostly forgotten on his lap.

Cooking show, an overly cheerful southern lady dumped a massive amount of butter in a bowl. She was making a pastry of some kind, Megamind wasn't sure, but it was the kind of thing Minion loved. He thumbed the button again. Rerun of a cop drama, idealized pigs, he'd pass. The next channel was featuring a bunch of college kids creating _real drama_ ; it was sickening how much this reality TV thing had taken off. The mindless sheep of this country really would watch anything. The television flickered again. Spaghetti western, it was a classic, but Megamind had watched it a dozen times already. Plus the blizzard the gunslinger was currently fighting the bounty hunters in was far too close to his past reality to provide a distraction from his current thoughts. He could really just go for some good music right now, but the next channel proved to a white rapper and some trippy visuals that were what passed as his music video. Next was the supposed history channel. They were covering a piece on ancient Roman gladiatorial combat. Why must everything conspire to remind him of his injuries? He winced as one of the reenactors got kicked down and combatants waited as the narrator explained how the emperor would decide if the fallen warrior would live or die. Quickly he changed the channel again.

He had the sinking feeling he'd be once again channel surfing his hours away with nothing to actually watch. This was painfully boring.

After a commercial for deodorant, just another reminder of how much hormone infused sweat humans produced, an anime started playing. He'd missed the first half of the episode, but it was light hearted enough. The main character seemed to be a villainous demon that was attached by some means, magical perhaps, to a young girl and they went around fighting other monsters. He relaxed back, picking at his food as he watched.

"Oh just kiss already!" the blue alien whined. They were so meant for each other. It was exceedingly obvious. He wished the characters would just realize it and stop dancing around their love. So boy was a demon, the girl's attitude already showed she didn't care about that. Everything else would surely work itself out.

The end credit song payed and Megamind let out an exasperated groan. It was torture. They'd played three episodes back to back, but now they would move onto other programing. He just wanted to see the two become lovers, was that so much to ask?

Back to channel surfing then. After making the rounds through several commercials, an old sitcom, and a ridiculous infomercial for an overhyped cleaning product, he ended up with a nature documentary.

"-the amazing octopus has with eight arms with 200 highly malleable suckers per arm-"

Megamind stared, eyes transfixed on the screen of the television, as the octopus in question curled its tentacle like arms against the glass of an aquarium; such a lude display. He could feel his face flush and was certain his cheeks and ears must be rosy. Biting his lip, he squirmed in his seat and glanced furtively at the cell door. He had thought that they blocked all the porn channels in prison. He hadn't seen anything this lurid since he and Minion discovered that mermaid movie.

The rational part of his brain reminded him that humans wouldn't have any reason to consider what he's watching pornographic. However the vast majority of his incredible intellect was entirely taken up by the way the octopus was stretching its tentacles out sweeping through the water as it now maneuvered through the ocean current. His hand wandered down between his legs, cupping himself through the rough prison uniform. He'd already been quite worked up before from that anime, now he was aching. He ground into his palm with a moan, trying to muffle the sound with his other fist. Megamind could already feel himself swelling, he just needed more contact. Unconsciously, he started tugging the orange prison garb open.

"Lights Out!"

10:00pm, the room plunged into darkness as the officer outside killed the power to his cell.

"FUCK!" The curse came unbidden to Megamind's lips, frustration sinking in as he stared longingly at the blackness before him and the vague shape of the television.

"Quiet down in there, prisoner."

The response was short and curt. Megamind must have missed the changing of the guards. Night shift; that meant old Crabby-Pants Rogers was in charge, great. Another veteran of the Megamind detail, he gave absolutely no fucks about the fact the Megamind didn't follow a human sleep schedule. Lights Out, meant quiet and sleeping for the entire damned seven hours.

Frustrated, sore, and horny, Megamind carefully stood and popped the seat of his chair up, depositing his forgotten dinner remains in the waste receptacle. Closing the lid again, he pushed the back rest down forming his bed. Laying down he tried his best to rein in his emotions. Getting so worked up wasn't going to help and without the sound of the television to mask the noise he'd make, he knew he'd never be quiet enough to continue what he'd started. Last thing he wanted was to give Ol' Crabby-Pants an excuse to further his punishment.

Restless, he stared at the ceiling of his cell, his home. Silently he promised himself he'd be out of here next Friday. This was going to be a long week. Six hours down, 146 more to go.


	2. Chapter 2 (139 hours)

Also I realize I borrowed Dani Kin's name for the Warden ^_^;; I just can't picture him as having any other name though.

Warning: talk about violent/sexual crimes/trauma

 **I don't own Megamind**

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 _4:54am Saturday, January 26th_

Six more minutes and the imbecilic outside would finally turn the blasted lights back on. Megamind was bored out of his considerable skull.

He'd lain awake for most of the night, unable to get comfortable. The swelling around his various injuries had lessened, but the pain remained. Without the distraction provided by watching even mindless entertainment, his bruised ribs and throbbing skull were the only things that could occupied his thoughts.

"Come on already," he groused, sitting up and looking forlornly around his cell for anything to divert his attention to.

Even without lights, his eyes had adjusted enough to be able to make out the hideously cute wall paintings. It had been his last therapist's idea of revenge, he supposed. He'd made the man cry and it seemed the doctor held a grudge. At least the Warden hadn't tried to saddle him with any other quacks after that.

Cuddly forest animals, that looked more suited to a nursery, covered his cell's walls with 'Happy Thoughts Make Happy People' written under a rainbow. It was vastly insulting. It wasn't like he'd even been a child at the time either; he'd been 15 years old for evil's sake. The Warden had left the painting up to spite Megamind, he was sure. So he'd upset the idiot doctor, he didn't know what the big deal was. The man hadn't known anything about Megamind's phycology, and why in the world would he have need some idiot human's help anyway.

He had Minion after all.

He hadn't needed some strange human telling him what he already knew, treating him like a child. If he would talk to anyone about what happened, it would be Minion and they'd already said all that really _needed_ to be said. Talking about it would have meant remembering it. So he'd done what he had needed to in order to make the idiot go away for good.

Now he just had to live with that constant reminder. Yay.

5:00am, Lights On and Cell Cleaning time, though it wasn't like there was really anything to clean. He didn't even have a normal bed or sheets and he didn't sweat all over the place the way humans did.

The lights flickered on overhead and the television powered to life. The nature channel was still showing, but currently on a commercial break. Megamind quickly switched it back to channel 8 news; just in case. Plus, Roxanne might be on.

The viewing window on his cell opened and there was a rap on the door.

"Prisoner count. Ya still in there, kid?" Care-Less Hank said with a chuckle.

He at least got how ridiculous following these procedures was.

Megamind sighed, "Yes."

"Great!" Said more softly, Megamind heard, "prisoner all accounted for, sir."

He must have been radioing the Warden an update. It must be so taxing counting to one, Megamind rolled his eyes. He was either here or he wasn't. He's not sure why they even bother.

Getting up he straightened his orange prison uniform, smoothing out the wrinkles. Annoyed, he realized he'd blead on it during the night. It seemed Megamind would need a new set of cloths after all. The chair folded back up into a seat position he fell back into it. Maybe he should move more gently, but letting the pain rule his movements would mean that it had won.

There really wasn't anything else to do now until breakfast, unless they did bring him a new outfit. The rest of the inmates wouldn't be awoken for another 23 minutes, then at 6:00am the shower block would begin. Megamind would be allowed into the showers to clean and shave before the rest of the inmates at 5:30am, but only on Mondays and Thursdays. It really wasn't needed otherwise unless he'd gotten dirty somehow. He glanced at the door. They might take him to the showers to clean the blood, though. Should he ask?

Indecision still waring in his head, he was unprepared for the knock on his cell door. Turning eyes wide and his hand over his fluttering heart, he looked up to see Dr. Zither looking as tired and grim as ever.

"How's the eye?" The doctor looked him over clinically, eyes narrow over his glasses.

"It's fine." The blue man could only mumble in response, Dr. Paul Zither always had a way of making Megamind feel like a child again.

The prison's doctor turned and signaled to the officer to the cell's left, where the desk was, to Hank most likely.

"Against the wall, Megamind." Oh, so Mr. No-Nonsense had also pulled the morning shift, today just couldn't get any better.

Megamind took his time reaching the wall. Make the jerk wait. Ha! Once he was in position, the door opened and the doctor entered. It wasn't nearly as bad as yesterday. He was well familiar with the doctor and without the fear rolling off the Cowboy, all that was noticeable from the officers outside was annoyance. When the door closed, Megamind relaxed and turned.

Dr. Zither was a mousey man with a world weary face and thin balding grey hair. He was barely taller than Megamind, but stood straight with a confidence that the blue alien had always admired. The doctor walked forward, pushing his small glasses up, though he only really needed them for the bifocals. At his gesture, Megamind returned to his chair and the doctor deposited the bag he'd carried in at the foot of it.

"This would really have been better done in the medical bay, but you really seem to have set our dear Warden off this time. So we must make due," Dr. Zither knelt, riffling through the bag, "Top down, let's have a look at you."

Blushing slightly, Megamind opened the jumpsuit and worked his arms out of it. They'd closed the view port, thank the evil gods above. He took off his undershirt too, tossing it aside. The doctor stood, stethoscope around his neck, and set a medical kit on the chair's arm rest.

He was very gentle as he took Megamind's face in hand; concern and tender fondness filled Megamind's senses, and deep sorrow. He was still grieving for the wife he'd lost ten years ago; he'd loved her so dearly and watching her slow passing had nearly broken the good doctor. Megamind hadn't ever met the woman, but he pictured her fondly. She must have been a wonderful person to be the recipient of such pure love. Megamind focused on the doctor's face and tried not to get lost in the emotions. Humans were often so casual with their touch, but to the blue man it was so very intimate.

Dr. Zither turned Megamind's head to the left and slowly examined the healing cuts and swelling. He gave a grunt of acknowledgement at Megamind's flinch of pain at the careful prodding. He continued in that fashion down the blue man's torso and arms, checking the progress of his healing. When he found the lacerations that had bled during the night, he popped open the med kit and begun cleaning and regluing and bandaging as needed. Relaxed, Megamind let himself be manipulated without comment, moving and breathing as told. No one knew his biology and health needs better then Dr. Zither, except Minion. The man had been there since day one and he was almost grandfatherly in his care.

Satisfied with everything so far, the doctor stood back and handed Megamind a clean undershirt, "Let's see to that ankle."

Without further prompt, he slipped on the white shirt and then removed the rest of the orange jumpsuit. After Megamind sat back down, Dr. Zither continued his examination and re-wrapped the twisted ankle, shaking his head as he did so.

"I'd tell you to take it easy, but I know you won't listen to me."

As he packed up his supplies, he produced a clean orange jumpsuit and Megamind dressed gratefully.

"You know, you were very luck it was so cold outside when you were brought in. It slowed your bleeding which is likely the only reason you didn't need a blood transfusion," the doctor frowned. "I have some of your blood banked downstairs, but if you keep up like this I'd prefer to have more on hand. It doesn't keep forever you know."

He was right, of course. Stored blood was barely usable past three weeks, though it was often stored for up to six. Minion had their own storage of medical equipment and blood bags at the Lair, but it was good to have backups and Megamind was far more likely to be brought to the prison after a serious injury then Evil Lair.

"Thursday," Megamind blurted out, then hesitated, "would I be healed enough for you to draw a bag by Thursday?"

He couldn't help but fidget under the near expressionless, knowing gaze that the good doctor gave him. Finally Dr. Zither nodded and scooped up his bag and the soiled cloths.

"Thursday, then."

Megamind sighed, sagging with relief and returned to the wall for the doctor to leave.

After Dr. Zither had left, one of the guards entered briefly. 7:00am, breakfast time, but when the door closed again without further interaction, Megamind's heart sank. It seems his separation from the rest of the prison population was still in full effect. That was going to make starting stage one of the escape plan exceedingly difficult. He'd been counting on passing coded messages through his Uncles. Plus he'd wanted to send a message to Minion, that he was ok. With the state he'd been removed from the battle in, he's sure his poor fish must be sick with worry.

Morosely, he returned to his chair and un-muted the television. This whole morning ordeal had left him melancholy. Breakfast wasn't doing anything to improve matters: instant oatmeal, orange juice, more toast triangles, a square of butter, some strawberry jelly, and the mud they called coffee. Normally there would also be milk, but cow's milk did weird things to the blue alien's digestion and the prison didn't bother with substitutions.

Despite the thick bitterness of the coffee they served, Megamind was tempted by it. Caffeine, like most human drugs, acted differently in his system. The chemical reaction it caused in his brain would confuse the receptors that created his empathetic reactions. It would leave him blissfully numb to the lingering residue of his _guests_ , but it came at a cost. He wouldn't be able to focus on anything for the next five hours at least, depending on the strength of the brew. Without anything more than the paltry offerings of daytime TV to occupy his thoughts, inducing that level of hyperactivity just wasn't worth it.

He set the paper cup aside and contemplated the rest of his meal. They were determinedly sticking to the paper _spoon_ , it seemed. Resigned, he folded it and sniffed at the oatmeal, cinnamon. Acceptable. Eating, he turned his attention to the news broadcast.

"The man who was shot last Wednesday, local Metro City police are now ruling an act of self-defense. Police Chief Riner told Channel 8 news that the alleged attack began as a simple automotive sale. Robert White, 46, and his wife, Rebecca White, 41, drove to Metro City's Parks neighborhood Wednesday morning to purchase a Ford Pinto being sold by Michael Hathway, 22. This transaction turned violent says-" the anchorman continued to drone on.

They were buying a car in the Parks area; of course it ended in violence. In all probability it was a stolen car, and why would anyone buy a Pinto anyway? Nothing but a death trap.

Though the name for that corner of the city might call to mind green tree covered recreation areas, the area was more of the industrial park variety. The criminal element in that neighborhood had no style what so ever, nothing but violent thugs and gangbangers. Megamind would never tolerate such crass behavior on his turf.

As it was, he contemplated going and roughing up the Breakers gang a bit, teach them not to go around making the rest of the criminal world look bad. He had a few warehouses near the area, nothing that he used regularly, but it was as good an excuse as any to start pushing into Parks and expand his domain. It would mean scheduling more Brain Bot patrols and months of skirmishes with the local gang leaders while the new pecking order was established, but with his cut of their takes it also meant more income. It would also halt Psycho Delic's drug ring expansion there. Win-win.

Megamind fidgeted back and forth in his chair, not really listening to the television, just watching. By now his fellow inmates and Uncles would be heading out to their work assignments. Some would be out doing road clean up despite the snow; others like Uncle Tony would be in the metal shop making license plates. Fondly Megamind remembered his first escape attempt, though it had been mostly accidental. He'd blown a hole in the wall that lead into the prison yard with his little license plate trike built in that very metal shop. Warden had been so mad. That was the first time he'd ever been grounded. Ah, how far he's come; Megamind can't help but chuckle.

He still had 4 hours and 12 minutes to kill before lunch. He could exercise, maybe? Flexing his ankle immediately put a stop to thoughts about jogging and jumping jacks and after taking a deep breath, sit-ups and push-ups were out too. Screw everything, he hurt everywhere.

Spinning around in his chair he timed his channel surfing to each pass around. He barely paused long enough to register what was on before changing the channel again: sitcom rerun of a married couple and kids, soap opera drama with an evil twin plot, commercial for candy, ridiculous children's cartoon, product advert telling the viewer to buy now, humans throwing balls at another team, now they were kicking them at nets, garbage, boring, trash… Why couldn't that anime he was watching last night be on?

He spun through the channels another five times.

What would Minion be up to? It was 9:47am so he would be up and about. If it was a normal day he would be gathering supplies for whatever Megamind's latest scheme was or maybe out on a shopping trip to one of their local suppliers. There weren't many business owners willing to sell to the two villainous aliens, but those that were, Megamind treated like family. They were accepted into the folds of his Uncles outside of prison, just another part of his small support network without which he'd never have survived his early years on the streets. Even now people like Manny Smith, the auto parts seller, and Cut-Throat Nancy who ran a butcher shop near Evil Lair were essential to Megamind and Minion's lifestyle.

Certainly the ichthyoid would be paying there associates a visit at some point while Megamind was locked up. Even if nothing was needed for the Lair, part of the arrangement was providing security for their associates' businesses. Some of the thugs on Nancy's block had been very slow on the uptake about what 'Under Megamind's Protection' meant. He'd put up graffiti and everything, following the code of the streets. They'd needed several broken bones and liberal use of his new demoralization setting on the de-gun before they'd begun to grasp that he was serious.

Those had just been the thugs though. It'd been so much harder to make the true villains and crime bosses take him seriously. He shuddered at the memories of what he'd had to do. At least with the rumors making it more gruesome with each retelling, he wouldn't have to repeat it anytime soon. As long as they believed that his threats weren't hollow he was able to get creative in his menacing. It worked much better that way.

Last he'd heard he'd supposedly offed three guards for 'looking at him wrong', drown Big Bill despite Bill still being alive and just in hiding, and let his Brain Bots eat the old leader of the Dock Boys gang. To be fair, he had let the Brain Bots maul Donald Wiggs quite a bit before he'd cubed him. The stubborn leader was now in semi-permanent storage in a sealed vault under Evil Lair until Megamind figured out what to do with him. The vault had grown to house 5 little cubes now, in water tight Tupperware; problems that didn't have solutions.

Sighing, Megamind made another rotation through the channels. Considering how much damage the Brain Bots had received, Minion would most likely be spending the majority of today doing repairs. He worried briefly over whether Minion himself was alright. His fantastic fish's heating unit had become over taxed yesterday after all, but the weather wasn't nearly as bad now, surely any damage to the unit had been minor. He had to believe that Minion was fine. It was the only thing that kept Megamind sane during his long prison stays, knowing Minion was outside and safe.

The Brain Bots weren't the only ones that needed better winter gear. Minion was so concerned about his Sir, but the ichthyoid was the one who needed better equipment. Megamind allowed his thoughts to drift and begun designing a new robotic suit for his Minion. His hands itched with the desire to actually be sketching out the ideas. Trying to keep all the details in focus, the blue alien did his best to envision everything in his internal drafting table, fingers twitching on his thigh holding an imagined pencil.

When lunchtime neared, he was fairly happy with the design. The suit would be bigger than Minion's current model, so Megamind had worked on refining the silhouette with more pronounced shoulders turning the general simian design of Minion's past suits into more of a gorilla. The larger arms would also let him increase Minion's strength again with the addition of some new alloys they'd been developing. All said and done it should prove a worthy upgrade for his lifelong companion.

12:00pm left him again alone in his cell with only wariness and a young officer's lingering axe body spray to accompany his meal: a tuna salad sandwich, chips filled with the dreaded trans-fats Minion made him avoid, another apple, and juice of the tomato variety from the smell of it. He ate the chips simply because no one was here to tell him not to. The act of rebellion only left him more homesick for his fishy friend, though.

Minion had made them Tuna steaks the night before the disastrous frozen battle. He'd come home aglow with joy over his purchase, a yellowfin tuna that had been caught using sustainable fishing practices. Minion was always so conscientious of that and tuna being so over fished, it was the ichthyoid's first time getting to properly prepare it. Their previous experiences with tuna were of the canned variety, much like the sorry excuse of a sandwich that faced Megamind now. Those steaks though, just the memory made the alien's mouth water. Seared to perfection with pineapple salsa as garnish, Minion had really outdone himself.

Megamind cursed as he bit into the sad thing that was his actual meal. After the memory of Minion's cooking, his sandwich tasted like wet cardboard. He did his best to choke it down, but only managed to eat about half before tossing the rest out.

Restless, Megamind ignored his injuries and paced his cage. He'd have preferred to move at a brisk walk, but all he could force his left leg into was a halting stride. Lost in his melancholy thoughts of home, of Minion, time passed slowly by.

4:30pm, Yard time. Maximum security prisoners would be allowed to spend an hour out in the concrete exercise yard and use the weights, basketball hoops, and phones. They couldn't deny him this, surely.

Megamind banged on his cell door, "Hey! You! Are you even paying attention to the time?"

"Quiet! We aren't supposed to be talking to you." It was the Cowboy.

Fraidy-Cat Cowboy came up to the window, his red hair a spikey mess of gel. He'd been the one coated in axe, if Megamind guessed correctly. The officer looked young, in his 20's most likely, and his badge named him as 'Officer McKinley'. Scottish family background? Megamind filed that away for later.

"4:30 is yard time, my dear man. Certainly you were informed of the schedule." Megamind quipped, eyebrows arched. At least it didn't hurt as much to move his face today.

"Yeah, no. You aren't tricking me. The Warden says you are to stay confined to your cell at all times, and not to let you intimidate me. He was very clear." Cowboy McKinley replied evenly, crossing his arms.

"No, no, no. I get yard time. I always get yard time. Ask Warden again." Megamind was desperate; this had to be a mistake.

"Oh give it a rest," the Cowboy sighed and returned to his desk.

"Let me talk to Warden!"

"You don't get to make those kinds of demands." Cowboy was gaining confidence; this wasn't going as planned at all.

Megamind heard the footsteps before he saw the man round the corner. All hope was not lost, speak of the devil and he shall appear. The prison warden, James Woodridge, was 47 but he'd started greying young. Was it Megamind's imagination or had the man gained more grey hairs since the alien's last visit? The Warden's even pace brought him up to the young office who was now standing at attention.

"I'll take it from here, Mr. McKinley. Why don't you take a smoke break?" Warden said in a soft but frim tone that brokered no disagreement. Megamind knew that tone well.

The Cowboy nodded with one last glance toward the blue prisoner, then with a "yes, sir!" he was gone.

Once they were alone, Megamind could only glare at the Old Man. Warden returned the look with a hard practiced stare he had perfected over the last 23 years. Megamind spun backwards and landed himself in his chair with feigned indifference.

"Well, Warden, shall I waste away in utter solitude? Or since I'm being such a good boy do I get to go outside and play?" He put on and overly cheerful voice and did his best innocent face, hoping the lingering bruises didn't spoil the effect.

"You're not fooling anyone with that act," Warden spoke harshly. The Old Man was always hardnosed, but this had to be something more.

"Oh come on! This is cruel and unusual punishment!" he whined, he couldn't help it.

"This isn't some game, these are peoples' lives! Damnit! Does that mean nothing to you?"

"As if the well-being of any of Metrocity's banal population is of any concern to me," Megamind scoffed, he could play this game, "Miss Ritchi's discomfort is meaningless when her presence is so vital to my plans."

"…that reporter, you're going to get her killed too one of these days." The Warden's eyes were dark, voice quiet, his head bowed and fists clenched in furry. Megamind could feel it seeping in through the air duct.

"Come on, it's not like someone died."

"John Quinn."

"What?" Megamind laughed out of surprise, that wasn't a name he'd been expecting to hear.

"Died in his cell Friday at 1pm, multiple stab wounds from an improvised cutting tool."

"You **cannot** be blaming me for that. I wasn't even in prison yet!"

The Warden's only answer was a hard glare.

"What‽ Am I supposed to be sad that the pedo got himself shanked?" Megamind exploded, hopping out of his chair and pacing with as much fury as his twisted ankle would allow.

John Quinn, the incident. Megamind very much remembered the fiend. It'd happened on his last visit to Metro City's Prison for the Criminally Gifted, Wednesday, family visitation day. Megamind was only anywhere near by because he'd been hanging out with Uncle Tony and Two-Tooth Gary. When the bastard had come over to the room, it was all over him. Lust. Not for someone's girlfriend who was visiting, not even for Gary's old mum who was there. No, the fucking monster had been staring right at Tony's granddaughter, his five year old granddaughter. Megamind had lost it at that point, everything had just gone red. He didn't exactly recall anything else until the guards had started hitting him with Tasers and dragging him off. He'd been spitting every curse he'd known at the Rock Spider, in several languages too. Megamind wasn't really sure what'd become of the monster after that, other than that it had involved the ER.

"You may not have done it yourself, but his blood is on your hands. Making accusations like that, you wrote his death sentence." The Warden's voice was hard and cold, "He had no record of sexual misconduct, his only felonies where embezzlement."

He's right of course. Even if Megamind hadn't killed the man personally he'd outed him as a child molester or at the very least a potential one. So many of the prison's inmates had children of their own, they didn't take kindly to chomos in their mix. It would have been one of his Uncles, he's sure of it, who took it upon themselves to finish what their blue boy had started.

"Oh so it's ok it's a smart pedo, you can do it if you don't get caught? Is that right, Warden?"

Twist the knife, Megamind thought to himself in twisted glee, and was rewarded by the flash of guilt across the Old Man's face.

"You can't use your own history to fuel a personal vendetta against anyone you suspect-"

"I DON'T suspect, I KNOW!" Megamind snapped, cutting the Warden off, "just because _you_ can't tell when you have a fucking pedophile under your nose doesn't mean _I_ can't."

Megamind had put those memories away for 8 years and he had no more desire to revisit them again now then he had any other time they'd threatened to resurface.

"You want me to be sorry that he's dead, well I'm not." The blue man snarled, glaring at the Warden.

He remembered then what he'd told the Old Man that fateful Wednesday while he was sitting in solitary, blood still covering his knuckles. _'I **would** have killed him, it's not like it would've been my first.'_

Drawing in a breath, Megamind reeled. No wonder the Warden was so wound-up. He'd never meant to admit that, especially not to the Warden of all people. He glanced, panicked, to the door.

"Don't know why I even bothered," said so softly that Megamind could barely hear it. The Warden looked up then, eyes dead, "Enjoy your 12 life sentences, **Megamind** ; you won't be seeing daylight again for a long time."

"…no"

Megamind's stumbling steps brought him to the door and he pressed his hands against the glass, staining to watch the retreating figure of the Warden as the man walked briskly away. His mouth was dry. Not like this. Never like this. He could feel himself choking, chest and throat tight with a sob. How long had he yearned for his Old Man to call him Megamind? Argued with Warden that the name he'd given the small blue boy was idiotic? That Warden had needed to accept that this life was his destiny?

But he'd never wanted his name to be said with such contempt. Never thought it would feel like disownment. All he had wanted…

All that Megamind wanted right in that moment was to be his Daddy's little Blue again.

5:30pm found Megamind curled in his chair, head resting on his knees. It took the officers three tries before Megamind acknowledged their existence enough to allow them to perform their entry procedure. He didn't even recall what dinner was or if he'd eaten any of it.

All he wanted right now was Minion.

He barely moved when the lights flicker off at 10:00pm, just hugged his legs closer to his chest. The pain the position caused grounding him to the present. 122 hours until Minion could make it better again.


	3. Chapter 3 (115 hours)

**I don't own Megamind**

* * *

 _Sunday, January 27th_

He's vaguely aware that he must have fallen asleep at some point during the night. This can only be a nightmare.

His parents were putting him in his little escape pod, only this time there was no panic siren. It's eerily quiet. They were trying to talk to him, not just the memories of what they had said, but trying to get him to listen. He tried to tell them that he couldn't hear, but even his own voice was swallowed by the horrible silence that was more the void of sound than the mere absence of noise. As if the sound was the first thing that the black hole was eating. He could see it, behind his father, looming. His mother touched him on the cheek; he expected the mix of sorrow, terror, love, and hope that had been his parents parting touches; instead it was horror and anger.

 _'What have you become?'_

He jerked away. The Warden had taken his mother's place, his once kind face twisted with disappointment and rage. Megamind fell backwards into the little pod and it plunged off the planet and into space. Pain blossomed through his head and shoulder as the little pod bounced through the meteor belt. Only this time there was no Mr. Goody-Two-Shoes, no Minion, he was alone in the dead of space. He drifted, engines dead and Earth still a blue spec in the distance. He'd never reach it.

Blinding white lights, he lay on a cold hard surface. Operating table. He hurt everywhere and he couldn't feel his right arm. What were they doing to him now? Someone was shouting at him. Panicked, alarmed, there was danger!

He convulsed as he came awoke, jerking in halting movements. Megamind was on the floor of his cell, the lights bright overhead, television playing mutedly in the background.

"Wake up!" the officer outside yelled again.

The guard was upset. Worried? No, panicking that something was wrong or that Megamind's strange behavior was a sign of an escape attempt. Slowly the world started making sense again. Megamind worked enough control into his tingling arm to push himself up and then sat blinking wearily. His back felt twisted and his neck was kinked from sleeping on the floor. He must have fallen off his chair. He massaged his sore shoulder, arm still tingling as blood returned to the extremity.

"You alive now?" The man was still trying to talk to him.

Megamind just blinked in response. His mouth felt like it had been stuffed with cotton, and that cotton had been taken out of the trash. He didn't feel coordinated enough to stand so he half crawled, half dragged himself closer to his chair and popped open the armrest to reveal the hidden mini sink. It was really just a hollow with a small tap and a pocket to hold his toothbrush and toothpaste. He used those now, trying to remove the lingering taste from his tongue. This was what he got for ignoring oral hygiene last night.

Water helped. He knelt, drinking from his cupped hands, ignoring the rest of the world. He could only focus on one this at a time. His brain still felt fuzzy, thoughts mushy. He must not have slept very well or for very long.

What time even was it? Officer What's-His-Name seemed to have been trying to get the blue man's attention for some time, definitely after 5:00am then. Remembering the guard's existence, Megamind twisted awkwardly to face him. This mostly consisted of slipping sidewise and bracing himself from falling.

"Wha' time?" his tongue still felt too thick in his mouth.

"Past time that you should be up and presentable. I won't have any of your nonsense," the correctional officer ranted, "Don't think feigning illness will make me drop my guard, Megamind!"

For What's-His-Name to be so worked up, Megamind must have pulled a fake out on the man before. He can't think of what or who though. He's sure it will come to him later, though.

Forcing himself to his feet, Megamind reset the chair and gratefully slid into it. He rubbed his face roughly, fingers catching on his scabs. His eye was far less swollen, but the cheekbone still throbbed reminding him just how long bones took to heal fully. He could use a shave, his chin felt like sandpaper.

Today was Sunday? Yes. So tomorrow they'd let him shave; unless the Warden had removed that right as well.

Truly this cage had become his hell.

He twisted in his seat trying in vain to get his spine to realign. It cracked and gave an echoing pop, but Megamind still felt like his back was a pretzel. He sat numb in the chair for what felt like ages, but might have only been minutes, trying not to think. It almost worked.

The banging at his cage's door brought him back to focus.

"Breakfast time. Against the wall, _super villain_ ," said with such sarcasm that it could only be one of the prison's correctional officers that had been there since Megamind's awkward teen years. "And don't you go getting used to this and start thinking you can use this to your advantage, ya little punk. Warden Woodridge has already thought of that. Crews are going to be in later today to fix you right up. Ain't that right, Rodney?" Mr. Sarcasm said turning to Officer What's-His-Name.

"Sure as shit."

Worst. Fucking. Day.

Megamind forced himself up and over to the wall and the guard entered. The contempt reeking off the man turned the alien's stomach. When the invasion to his space was over, breakfast revealed itself to be better than normal, Sunday's usually were: half way decent biscuits, a grey lump of congealing gravy, overcooked scrambled eggs, orange liquid pretending to be juice, and thick black coffee. He downed the coffee without further thought, swallowing it in a single go. He dropped the paper cup to the floor, he'd deal with that later, and waited for the caffeine to kick in.

He didn't want to feel. He didn't want to think.

It was strong coffee. His thoughts started sparking behind his eyelids, so Megamind turned them to the television and cranked up the volume. KMCP Channel 8 News was beginning its morning news program.

"Up next, it's 7:06 and even though the winter storms have been driving us indoors, you can still find family fun activities at the Metro City Aquarium. Our star reporter, Roxanne Ritchi, got to spend some time with the staff learning how they work with the otters. Check it out." The cheery anchorwoman announced from the couch they did their morning segments on.

A lazy grin spread on his face and the blue man tucked into his breakfast, he was always in the mood to watch Roxanne's pieces.

The footage switched to prerecorded film of the aquarium where one of the otter handlers talked Roxanne through the games they taught the otters to help exercise and stimulate them. Roxanne, always so quick, mentioned how the training must also help them move the otters without directly handling them. She's correct of course and the handler described how the training aids them in veterinary examinations.

He sipped at his _orange juice_ , did it taste weird? Yeah, defiantly weird, or was that the toothpaste still on his tongue?

Somehow Roxanne could make any subject fascinating, not that otters weren't interesting already.

Still tasted weird.

 _Enhydra lutris_ , the sea otter, a marine mammal and member of the weasel family native to the Pacific Ocean; especially noteworthy for their use of tools, namely rocks which they gather and open their food with.

Also cute.

Not as cute as Roxanne in that dress though. She wore a fashionable short black dress paired with a bright yellow suit jacket. It made a striking combination. Her hair was loose that day, and Megamind bit his lip as she tucked a strand behind her ear, pearl earrings. Her smile was lovely and she laughed brightly as she tossed a fish to one of the otters.

He'd love for her to wear that during a kidnapping, but not in winter, no, during summer. It would be hot, there being little ventilation in the warehouse he was holding her in. He wouldn't want her to be overly uncomfortable or sweaty on camera later so he'd offer to help her take the jacket off. He'd have to help; her hands were tied after all. She'd agree and as he neared she'd give him a smoldering look through her eyelashes…

Smoldering? To smolder, verb, to burn slowly with smoke but no flame. No that can't be right. Smolder, verb, show barely suppressed passionate emotion such as hatred or anger; synonyms: seethe, fume, simmer.

Anger, dear evil gods, Roxanne would be furious if he made such advances toward her. She'd knee him the moment he got close to her with a "Ha! Serves you right." What was he even thinking?

The eggs were rubbery and not at all conducive to being eaten with the paper spoon-thing. He piled them on the biscuit halves and tried eating them that way. Mostly it just made a mess as the egg fell off in bits, landing back on the cardboard tray.

Wow, that coffee was really strong.

Oh, what did they even make this gravy out of? Soy? Gross.

Roxanne was talking again, "from the Metro City Aquarium, this is Roxanne Ritchi, on behalf of the sea otters twins Castor and Pollux, hoping to see you here soon."

Shit her piece was already done. They were back in the news room now and going to weather.

Ugh, he really shouldn't have had that coffee. His thoughts bounced, disjointed and chaotic.

Why had he? Or right he didn't want to think. Well he was, but too much, too fast, for it to really matter. Thoughts careened through his skull like a humming bird on speed.

Didn't matter, too late now.

The news played out before him, phrases and images inspiring tangents of thought from calculating the surface area of Lake Michigan, to designing a device that would omit a frequency capable of interfering with the human mind in such a way as to disrupt the brain functions dedicated to interpreting the written word, to analyzing the chemical makeup of perfume and olfactory memory. Each thought spiraled out of control demolishing what came before.

If he'd had something to write on, maybe something useful might have come from this exhausted hyperactivity. Instead he simply fidgeted, eyes alternating between focused and glazed over; hands gesturing, clasping, fingers bitten in thought, twisting out calculation in the air, to fall uselessly to his sides again.

When KMCP News managed to gain his attention again, he'd been arguing the relevant applications of solar power to the cartoon rabbits on his cell wall. Not because he thought they would respond, but because he needed to say something out loud and they were convenient and looked argumentative.

Roxanne came on screen, the footage shaky. "I'm here at the site of the latest attack to our city. Behind me, the man going by the name Destruction Worker, is attacking the US 31 overpass into downtown Metro City. There!" Roxanne shouted suddenly, pointing. The camera swung up and re-focused so that a white figure could be seen flying toward the bridge. "Metro Man, defender of Metro City! He appears to be getting the trapped motorists off the bridge."

The footage continued, but not much could be seen from the distance they were forced to film from. Metro Man lowered cars down to the road below and seemed to be trading banter with Destruction Worker, though Megamind couldn't imagine the dialog would be very stimulating. He'd been introduced to the Jack-Hammer-Wielding-Buffoon last month as the man was the latest addition to the group now calling themselves the Doom Syndicate.

Ha! What a joke. Psycho Delic's little posse of three. The purple Drug Lord had tried to tempt Megamind to join. As if! That man made his skin crawl enough to cause nausea.

The Syndicate was such a joke; a rage fueled maniac out to destroy 'the man', a flirtatious witch of a woman wreathed in pink flame, led by a slim ball drug dealing pimp. Megamind was sure the only reason Psycho wanted him was because they needed more members to be seen as legitimate to the national Super Villain leagues.

Megamind really didn't have the energy to deal with the world outside Metrocity; it was hard enough trying to keep track of the political landscape of the criminal underworld here. Dear evil gods, he'd go insane trying to handle anything more.

Was Metro Man not done yet? How long was he going to take with that clown? The man wore an orange cone as a helmet for crying out loud.

Also they should really be supporting that bridge pillar. A semi had run into it during the chaos and large chunks of concrete and rebar crumbled off of it.

The entire structural integrity of the overpass was severely weakened already. The money this city, no the country in general, put into infrastructure was depressing small. They might send out crews to patch the pot holes, maybe, or repave a major road, but Megamind was sure in his entire time on Earth he hadn't seen them rebuild or do major repairs on any of the city's bridges or highways. That was unless they'd been destroyed, and that hardly counted as a sound infrastructure repair plan.

As the continued efforts of Destruction Worker above rattled the overpass again and as the camera man moved to get a better angle, Megamind calculated the structural integrity of the bridge. Wind speed based off how much Roxanne's hair was blowing, temperature based on the weather report an hour ago, average weight per car added to the bridge's mass, and basing the state of the bridge before the attack off his observation of two months ago. He gave it a 76% chance of collapsing in the next 10 minutes with a 5% margin of error.

Roxanne was talking again, but he was having a hard time focusing on her words; his thoughts bouncing back and forth. The way she held her hand up to tame her loose hair that kept threatening to blow into her face as she spoke into the mic and the wind capturing her puffs of breath visible in the chilly air. Frantic calculation on the speed Metro Man was moving, assessing his nemesis at every chance he got. The vehicle that Metro Man just lowered, a flashy blue motorcycle, he should really build himself something like that, it looked fun.

No, he's distracted again. What was important?

Oh right, the bridge which was now crumbling under all the combined stresses. Was Metro Man really trying to prop the entire bridge up with the busted semi-trailer? Yes, dear god he was. The numb skulled troglodyte had no understanding of basic architecture. Or physics, or anything! How did he survive?

The bridge continued to collapse, buckling around the imbecilic hero. When the dust cleared and the camera man zoomed back in, the only solid piece left of the US 31 overpass was the part Metro Man was holding up.

Idiot.

At least the coffee seemed to be wearing off a bit; Megamind's focus was beginning to return to him.

Outside his cell's door he could hear the guards changing their shift. Was that important? Time, what time was it? He needed to be memorizing their patterns, finding what all else had changed since his last visit.

Roxanne was wrapping up her report; it seemed the brainless defender had scooped up Destruction Worker as he was trying to flee the wreckage of concrete, asphalt, and cars.

Right, time! He was supposed to be focusing.

"Lunch!"

Oh, that made it convenient. Megamind slapped his cheeks, trying to ground his thoughts.

12:00pm… or just slightly after.

He swung himself out of the chair and sauntered over to the wall. His ankle protested, but he ignored it.

Hank was back. Megamind was growing to like Hank; he was ok as far as guards went. However, it was eerie as the guard entered his cell. The blue alien knew there was someone in the room, but he didn't know who; or what they were planning.

Was this what it felt like to be normal? Numb and blind to the people around you? Maybe that's why humans were so cruel to each other. They had to pay attention to another being in order to register their emotions. It had taken Megamind so long to learn that trick. That humans took their emotional cues from others via facial expressions, gestures, and vocal tones. Genius that he was, he considered himself quite a good mimic. He'd mastered this nonverbal human language like he had their spoken ones. Even more amusingly, he could lie with his face. He still found the concept immensely amusing; being able to lie about your emotions just by contorting your face in a certain way. It wasn't like his people didn't use facial expressions, but it was so secondary to the direct emotion language the blue race used. Human expressions felt so overly dramatic by comparison.

Megamind almost forgot what he was supposed to be doing half way through the food delivery. He caught himself as he nearly took his hands off the wall; the sudden intake of breath from the officer behind him had brought him back to reality. Megamind glared accusingly at the cartoon wall rabbit. This was clearly its fault.

Door closed and left alone again, lunch revealed itself to be BBQ chicken wings which they may not have screwed up, round green mushy vegetables, yet more toast that they were obsessed with, butter at least made it better, and spicy smelling red juice.

They'd made him miss Roxanne's sign off; he glared accusingly at the cell door.

Megamind was starting to lose it; he could tell that much. It wasn't just the caffeine still hammering away in his system. Sleep deprivation was taking its toll. The edges of his vision were fuzzy, tunnel vision, that's what they called it.

And the Isolation.

He hadn't had physical contact with anyone other than the good doctor since Metro Man had dropped him off. It had never been this bad before. Megamind had never earned a grounding or solitary stint that lasted longer than 12 hours before. In prison there had always been an Uncle nearby, even in these later years he at least had company during meals and yard time. Now…

Nothing.

Megamind ate his chicken alone in a circular cage surrounded by the mocking mural of a tormentor, trapped by cruel men with badges that made them brave, and entertained only by a device that served to remind him of the world he was forcefully separated from. Even as a man that was used to solitude, in Evil Lair he was never alone. His Lair was always filled with life, and his dear fish.

More than anything he wished that Minion would forgo the plan and just spring him now.

Nonchalant Hank appeared at the cell's view port. "Hey kid, you got a visitor waiting for ya."

Megamind froze in shock, "Really?" That fantastic fish had become a mind reader!

"Yup, I take it you want to meet him them?" Hank replied, there was something off about the way he said it, but Megamind's tired brain wasn't sure what.

"Yes, definitely."

He tossed the remains of his lunch tray; he didn't like eating veggies on good day so the peas could just go rot. Megamind assumed his position on the wall with glee.

He was nervous as the guard approached him with the chains in hand. As much as quieting the bombardment of unwelcome emotional noise was a relief, Megamind felt unarmed not knowing the intentions of the person approaching him. It could be very helpful when he was administering terror into the hearts of Metrocity's citizens, but being numb was detrimental when he wasn't in control of the situation.

Quickly and professionally his ankles were cuffed, wrists bound and chained to his waist. Hank led Megamind by his chain with Officer Rodney leading the party and the Cowboy taking rear guard. Megamind tried to check for changes in the hall that he was led through, but he was far too distracted trying to figure out what variation on an escape plan that Minion was pulling off. They turned him at a corner that led not to the more secure visitation area with the plated glass and speakers used to separate prisoners and guests, but to a more private room usually reserved for the better behaved or meetings with lawyers. Neither of which had ever applied to Megamind.

The room they entered was a concrete square with a metal table bolted to the floor in the center. A sturdy metal chair sat on one side with links in the floor that his chains could be attached to. Opposite was a more comfortable looking padded metal chair. The room had no windows, but cameras were mounted in each corner. The officers patted him down checking for contraband and lock picks, than after Megamind was securely locked to chair and floor with only a few inches of slack for movement; the guards left him.

When the door opened again Megamind was speechless. This had not even entered into the realm of possibilities in his head.

Metro Man stood in the doorway, hand still on the knob. He just stared at the blue alien for a moment; then turned and spoke quietly to the guards outside. His white fur mantled cape was dirty and torn. His perfect hair mussed. As Metro Man shut the door and approached the remaining seat, Megamind noticed the recording lights on the cameras switched off. It seemed the hero wanted their meeting to be private.

The large man sat awkwardly in the metal chair, his white cape bunching up behind him. Metro Man looked tired, more so then Megamind ever remembered the flawless hero looking before. In truth, Mr. Perfect didn't look very flawless at all at the moment. As they both sat in silence Megamind scrutinized his nemesis. White gloves coated in so much dirt and motor grease that they looked grey in a way that would never wash out, the trade mark swoop of hair falling into a face which was smudged with more grime, his left sleeve torn revealing a sculpted bicep marred by nothing worse than dirt, fur trim matted down with stitching coming loose; the man looked disheveled. Metro Man folded his hands in his lap with his head bowed, seemingly content just sitting in silence.

Megamind cursed himself for drinking that damned coffee; he needed to know what this was. He felt lost, staring at the other alien; this was so far outside of their normal behavioral pattern that Megamind was flying completely blind. No, that was stupid, he'd know Wayne since they were children. This was just a puzzle and he was a genius. Work it out.

"Something happened," Megamind reasoned, "I saw you fight with Destruction Worker. I feel it's a safe bet to assume you just finished dropping him off to his new cell. I can only extrapolate then that your out-of-character behavior is directly related to the events of that fight. Other than your complete inability to understand the structural integrity of highway overpasses, from the news footage shown, nothing seemed overly problematic. So it must not have been caught on camera." Megamind trailed off watching Wayne for any reaction.

"It's weird whenever you talk like that, you know?" Wayne spoke softly, head still bowed, but his clasped hands tightened and his shoulders tensed.

"Well you broke character first! I don't see why I should be expected to play my role if you don't have the decency to remain in yours." Megamind really wished he could cross his arms as he huffed. Wayne was making all this so difficult.

"Broke character?" Wayne finally looked up, brows creased and frowning.

"Yes!" Megamind waved his hands for emphasis, though as they were chained to the arm rests that resulted in him just flapping his hands in large alien's general direction, "You are the perfect, unbreakable hero; a beacon of flawless perfection to the citizens of Metrocity. What even is this?" Disgust colored Megamind's words, "Fawning over the fallen bad guy. Cradling him like- like he was the _damsel_. For FUCKS sake Wayne! Visiting you nemesis in prison, for what? A heart to heart because you had a bad day heroing? You come here for a pep talk?"

Wayne just stared at him, eyes wide and mouth slightly open. Megamind just glared back, was it because he swore? He always had pride in not lowering himself to the use of vulgar language in his villainous role, but prison always did bring out the worst in him. Or that was to say his internal filter simply slipped more often. Really, what was the point of censoring himself when he was still tame in comparison to the foul mouths of his fellow inmates? That might have been the first time he's ever sworn in his nemesis' presence though. The more Wayne simply stared at him, he's sure of it.

Megamind turned away, glaring at the wall to the left. He's so lost in thought that he didn't realize Wayne moved until he felt the gentle touch against his cheek below his damaged orbital and fading bruise. He froze, but the presence of the fingers refused to prove themselves as illusions of his tired mind. Slowly he turned his head to look back at Wayne. The motion caused the white gloved hand to cup his cheek, the thumb resting on his chin right below his bottom lip. The way Wayne was looking at him, touching him, so reminiscent of the way the hero had held him that bloody afternoon in the snow.

Megamind's vision darkened and he realized that he wasn't breathing.

He gasped and jerked back but the motion barely moved him. The reaction though, caused Wayne to withdraw his hand, tucking it back into his lap. The large man looked away, his brows lowered and mouth drawn.

Heart hammering in his chest, Megamind just sat, reeling. The **fuck** was that‽

Wayne seemed to compose himself slightly; he sat straighter though his hands were still fisted in his lap, "Four people died. When the bridge collapsed. Because I couldn't do anything," the invulnerable alien closed his eyes and turned his face up to the ceiling, "because despite all these powers, I was useless. They died because of me. Like you almost…"

Megamind could picture it, the bridge collapsing; there had still been cars on it. Metro Man had spent the entire fight moving vehicles off the bridge one by one. He'd had to. If the super powered alien had used his full speed he could have been done in less than a minute, but the people in those cars would never have survived the forces that would have applied to them. Maybe Wayne had even tried to save some of them with super speed. Unbidden the image of a car painted red from within blossomed in Megamind's thoughts; he shuddered, that might explain Wayne's behavior.

"You didn't kill those people," Megamind spoke softly, "Destruction Worker did. He's a real piece of work that one. Doesn't have any style, only thing he cares about is causing as much chaos of possible."

Megamind had dug into the man's records; Milton Gibbons had been an unnoteworthy office worker at a software company until the day he burned it down. He'd managed to avoid the arson charge somehow and his next listed employment was at a construction site. That lasted for all of a year before one of the buildings that the company had just recently finished was demolished with a TNT blast that shook Metrocity. The pattern continued form there and construction tools became his means of chaos. His plans never seemed to involve much other than destroying large bits of the city to bring down 'the man' which was usually represented by the government, large corporations, or just big buildings he didn't like.

Wayne barely moved as he spoke, his body still tense, "I should have been able to save them."

"You can't save everyone," Megamind reminded him.

"But I'm the hero aren't I?" Wayne snapped, finally looking at Megamind again, "No one ever dies when we fight."

"That's different."

"Yeah? How so?" Wayne demanded, incredulous.

Did he not know? Certainly the large man wasn't that dense. Megamind always assumed his nemesis just had the decency to never point out all the obvious safety mechanisms littered throughout Megamind's evil machinations of destruction. There was safety netting, kill switches, the fact that they always fought their really destructive battles in abandoned lots and even when they did fight in the city they always gave the citizens plenty of time to clear out. For evil heaven's sake they once paused in the middle of combat because some drunken idiot had wandered to close to the battle. How could Wayne not know that their fights were different?

"What do you want from me, Wayne?" Megamind was exasperated.

The hero seemed to deflate, "I don't know. I just… I just need to clear my head."

"The hero isn't accountable for the actions of the villain. A maniac threatened the safety of some citizens; you stopped the bad guy and saved countless lives. He killed people, you saved others." Megamind spoke flatly; he couldn't believe he actually had to give his rival a pep talk. This was humiliating. Wayne just stared at him, so he continued, "It doesn't matter if you mess up or if things don't always go as planned, you have a role to play. The people need you. Metrocity needs its icon, its hero."

Wayne looked away again, eyes narrowed and tense. This was getting nowhere.

Speaking just to fill the void, Megamind sighed, "Look, if we're just going to throw all social decorum out the window, can I ask a favor?"

The large man faced him once more; eyebrows raised then narrowed his eyes, "What kind of favor?"

"I need to get a message passed on to Minion. To let him know I'm alright." Megamind hated having to use his rival for this task, but his options were sorely limited at the moment and he'd be a fool to pass up this opportunity, "There is a butcher on the corner of Lenard and Grant Street, its run by a woman named Nancy. I want you to tell her 'Order for fresh fish from Mr. B. on the sixth. It's well done, but the recipe needs work. He wants 5 pounds of the salmon and 2 pounds of the cod on Friday.' You got all that?"

"You want me to order you fish?" Wayne sounded genuinely confused.

"It's code, you idiot, for her to pass on to Minion so that he knows not to worry about my health." It was more than just an update on his health, but Wayne didn't need to know that. "Will you do it or not?" Megamind snapped.

Wayne scrunched his face before nodding, "Yeah, ok… tell it to me again."

Megamind repeated the coded message and had Wayne repeat it back to him six times before he was satisfied that the hero wasn't going to mess it up, "I'd also greatly appreciate if you wouldn't go into that neighborhood in uniform. It may draw unwanted attention to Nancy's business."

The hero paused before nodding in consent. He stood then and straightened his cape. As he crossed the room and reached for the door, Megamind found himself calling after the hero.

"If you like pork, you should try some of her sausage rolls. They're fantastic." And then he was alone again.

The guards returned shortly after and performed a far more thorough search. As if Metrocity's defender was going to smuggle contraband to him. Ha! Though maybe they had noticed how weird Metro Man had been acting, too.

Then back to his cage. A cage with a new door. Once inside, Megamind crouched and inspected the new addition. On the bottom of the door was a metal panel that looked like it could be slid up for items to be passed inside. His little home was now a true solitary confinement cell.

Destitute, he flopped back on his chair. Every single thing was conspiring against him. The only consolation of this entire week was if Metro Man actually did pass on his coded message and even that was as far outside routine as was physically or mentally possible.

Megamind had completely lost track of time again, so he flipped the television back on and turned to the news.

2:37pm, the helpful anchorman informed him as he launched into an interview with a local pizza restaurant owner. Megamind let his mind drift, to melancholy even to bother channel surfing.

As the hours slipped away, Megamind was only aware that the caffeine had worn off when he felt his body begin reacting completely contrary to his thoughts. He'd been contemplating past battles, trying to further puzzle out this strange turn in his nemesis' behavior; his body however was responding to far more base thoughts.

Megamind took a deep breath. He could smell it, feel it; lust, desire, faint but there. He moved closer to the door, and sat with his back to the wall. Through the cracks in the door, it came. Megamind muted the television and in the quiet could hear the guard's soft noises. Masturbating at work, the naughty man, probably snuck in a porno mag or something.

Megamind knew of such things of course, but they never did anything for him. For him to get aroused it took emotional stimulation, it was possible to achieve with romantic media, but only just. Normal porn held no interest for him and he only rarely masturbated. He had discovered though, in these prison walls, that he could get off on someone else's lust. Humans gave off such strong emotions and hormones during arousal that the experience could end up reminiscent of being intoxicated for the blue alien.

Breathing deeply he focused on that feeling, let it wash over him. It'd be better if the man was in the room, the reaction would be so much stronger.

He imagined going up to the window and beckoning the officer inside. He'd threaten the man into silence, bribe him into compliance. He would be in control of the encounter. He always was, when he dabbled in such things. He'd push the man down into the chair and straddle him. If the fool dared to try and touch him, a sound bitch slap would set the man straight. Touching only went one way. He'd be rough, it was expected; he was a super villain after all. He'd bite and lick and take. The man would smell like musk and lust. Exotically hairy and hard. That hardness, he would take it in his hand and work it until the man begged. Then he would taste the man, that musky salty release, the result of human passions.

Megamind gasped as he worked his fingers into his sensitive flesh. Soft and yielding where human males were so hard. His tentacles extended out of his body and wound around his hand, slick with lubrication. The blue alien shuddered with pleasure.

Moaning softly in a small fluttering orgasm, he felt his body relax again. He removed his slick hand from his jumpsuit and licked it clean, relishing his own taste. Megamind didn't care if it might be considered weird; everything about his sex was weird. He decided long ago to just do what felt right, screw human norms.

Touching himself alone like that wasn't as good as having a playmate in the cell with him, but much safer. The prison officers weren't safe. Megamind was so careful about those few he chose as his Prison Bitches; men who were safe, trustworthy, who would obey the strict rules Megamind set. So far there had only been two he'd ever interacted with directly, and even then it was only sex if you thought of giving a blowjob while masturbating as sex. Now there likely wouldn't ever be anymore encounters. He supposed it didn't really matter. Those interactions had been a flirtation with danger and youthful experimentation. Minion would be horrified to know what his Sir had been up to these past few years when behind bars.

He heard footsteps approach outside and furtively tried to wipe his hand clean and look inconspicuous. The soft curse and thump on the other side of the wall indicated the officer outside was doing the same.

As it was, it seemed Megamind hadn't needed to bother. Without ceremony his tray of food was deposited through the new slot in his cell's door and the footsteps began retreating.

Megamind curled his arms around his legs, mood entirely lost. The brief respite and distraction provided by the guard being just that, brief and now gone. He was bone weary, he should sleep, was long overdue to sleep. His mind had just been too active to let him relax enough. Now though, his body relaxed fully and his mind slowly followed, drifting into disjointed meanderings; he was too tired to even bother moving.

Sleep finally claimed him, curled against the wall of his cell. The hours ticked away.


	4. Chapter 4 (uncountable hours)

Warning: References to sexual trauma

 **I don't own Megamind**

* * *

 _Night, a Dark Cell_

He awoke with a start when his head collided with the floor, the sharp blossoming pain bringing him swiftly to consciousness. It's dark, the power was out to his cell. Megamind felt more aware then he had before, he must have had a few hours of sleep at least. On the floor again. His body protested that fact as he tried to move and straighten himself out.

Food, he's starving. Megamind moved his way over to the door by feel. Casting his hands around, he found nothing. Did he dream them delivering his dinner last night? No, on the new door panel was a smear of something sticky. Smelled like apple juice. They must have spilled it when they pushed the tray under the door… but it's not here. He casted his search out farther from the door; still nothing. The bastards! They must have taken the tray away after he fell asleep.

Fuming, Megamind made his way to his chair. After brushing his teeth, he filled his belly with water to try and fool the hunger pangs. Not the first time he's spent the night hungry and far from the worst. At least he's not cold on top of it. During his and Minion's first year living on the streets, he'd gone to bed starving and freezing more often than not. This was nothing.

Megamind laid down in his chair turned bed and focused on realigning his spine. Spending so much time twisting up his back would do his healing process no favors.

How much time was left before the officer outside returned power to him? Megamind wasn't sure and that bothered him greatly. It's so easy to lose focus when trapped alone and without stimulation. He's seen men go crazy from solitary confinement; he didn't want to be one of them.

Sleep, it would pass the time and he's sure he could still use more. He'd been horribly sleep deprived even before coming back to the prison. As Megamind laid staring at the nothing of the ceiling, his mind still wouldn't quiet itself. Sighing, he turned his thoughts inward, daydreaming his Lair into existence.

Before him the ceiling lit up, illuminated by dimmed work lights and hovering Brain Bots. It was night, even if he didn't know the time, so he'd be in bed. A black comforter and black sheets spread around him over his small matters. Above him would be the half canopy he'd hung up to help block the light that would stream in through the office's window upon daybreak. The dark fabric would block most of the light so that he could sleep even during the day, but when the sun shone through the cloth a star field would appear through painstakingly arranged pin points. It was the stars as seen from his home world. Sometimes it was painful to look at, sometimes comforting.

He would curl himself up in his blanket, unable to sleep but knowing he should. It was a common dilemma for the blue alien. Times like this he would love to talk to Minion about what was bothering him or just have company, but Minion would be fast asleep and Megamind wouldn't want to wake him. That's why he couldn't talk to Minion right now. He'd have to entertain himself.

He'd slip out of bed, quietly; Minion would be snoring away in his little castle in his big tank in the corner of the office they'd turned into their bedroom. Minion's large robotic suit sat charging in the corner. The Brain Bots would get excited seeing their Daddy awake and he'd have to hush them.

Number 8 would be the most rambunctious. 8 was the oldest of all the Brain Bots still functioning so its programing was the shakiest. It acted more like the canine its brain tissue was cloned from than any of his later models. They all were just happy little puppies, but 8 didn't have to level of sophisticated programing and equipment to refine its behaviors. Minion often groused that they should just retire all the Bots left from their first batches. They were notoriously unreliable and couldn't be trusted on missions outside of Evil Lair, but Megamind had a soft spot for his creations of science. So the little cyborgs stayed despite the constant need of repairs and 8's love of biting him.

So Megamind would cradle 8 in his arms to quiet its whining and took it downstairs with him, the other Brain Bots following in his wake. There would only be a few of them, they knew he would only allow at most five of them to hang around his room. There were just so many of them now. They took turns, fought each other to create pecking orders, and he had his favorites of course. Tonight it would be 23 who they would be keeping an eye on for its recovery, 24 because it always went were 23 was, the scamp 12 would be around too most likely crewing on something of Megamind's, and of course 53 would be there. 53 had been the only survivor of a disastrous mistake last year. Megamind had made a grievous error in his calculations which had resulted in his Lair's reactor becoming woefully unstable. He'd sent in an entire team of Brain Bots to fix the issue before it could get any worse, but the fires had spread so far and so fast. In the end he'd lost nine bots. 53 had not only finished shutting down the reactor alone, but managed to recover from the injuries he'd received in the line of duty. Megamind had outfitted him with more spikes and a flashier paint job as a reward. Now he barely left his Daddy's side and Megamind feared he was spoiling his precious cyborg.

As Megamind would be making his way down the open metal stairway that lead from the warehouse's upper office floor to the workshop below, Megamind would absentmindedly stroke 53's dome. The bots around him would all 'bowg' happily. Once down in the workshop area they'd fan out around him and a few more Brain Bots would join their ranks, waiting to see if Daddy needed them or if it was play time.

There would be his drafting table and stool sitting under his huge idea cloud, the cards fluttering as they were stirred by the passage of the excited Brain Bots. Off to the side would be his black leather sofa and the giant television Minion had acquired recently. There would be movies and games he could use as entertainment, they'd wired up all the gaming consuls they'd acquired over the years into one super machine that could run whatever game they wanted without the need to have multiple devices plugged into the television or needlessly switching back and forth.

His stomach made itself known again, but he ignored its grumblings. The kitchen of Evil Lair would be fully stocked with food, but Megamind knew well that imagining food would only make his hunger worse.

Instead he wandered over to the couch and settled himself into the plush cushions. Megamind leaned back into the couch stretching out stiff muscles. The cold metal and thin padding of his metal chair intruded on his dream world as he shifted and stretched out, he struggled to maintain the illusion and stilled his body once more. The Lair around him blurred out of focus.

He breathed evenly, slowly. Focused on the way he knew the couch would feel and smell of leather, how he would be able to feel the hum of electricity through 8's dome where the Brain Bot would still be nestled in his arms. Focused on the way the Lair would smell of grease and rust, with the lingering odors from Minion's forays into Indian curry still clinging to the kitchen walls. He focused on the way the lights would create patterns of shadows on the wall and how the dust danced in the beams of bright light shining from the ceiling.

This was home.

It was home not because it was permanent or because they were overly attached to the building. No, it was just a warehouse that was convenient, just like the five Evil Lairs before it and like all the ones yet to come. No, it was home because this was where Minion was, were he hung his ideas in fluttering clouds of consciousness, where his cyborg puppies played and made happy noises, where Minion experimented with learning new and interesting skills… where he didn't have to be Megamind. In this place, in Evil Lair, he could just be. No pretense, no presentation, just him and his lifelong companion and their creations. Where the only thing he had to be was Sir and where if his name was said at all, it would be in the softest of whispers in a dead alien tongue unpronounceable with human vocal chords.

The blue alien man folded him hands over his stomach, relaxed and eyes closed, for all the world at peace in his dark cell. Dreaming of home, his thoughts drifted in his light sleep.

When the lights to his cell came back on some time later he was awake, but disoriented. The ceiling above him was white, the lights too bright, and it wasn't Minion calling him.

"Get your sorry ass up, Megamind."

He knew where he was, how could he forget? He really shouldn't feel this disappointed about reality. He was Megamind, master of all villainy; he laughed at disaster and took prison as a mocking challenge. Fuck, he was just not in the mood for any of this today. Today would be a wonderful to just stay in the Lair with a good book and tinker on a few meaningless personal projects.

He rolled forward, sitting up and gave the officer outside his best death glare.

"Well aren't you a bright and beautiful ray of sunshine!" Officer Sarcasm rattled off with a shit eating grin, "didn't sleep well princess?"

Princess? The man was just mocking him. It was a common trope among human males to try and demasculinize their opponent verbally. Using female pronouns and references or suggesting their opponent had features less than that expected of the idealized male norm as a form of humiliation. He wasn't, couldn't be, referring to anything else. Don't acknowledge it.

Megamind got up methodically, ignoring the guard. He reset the chair, washed his face, brushed his teeth again just to be busy, he could feel the man still watching him. With the television playing Megamind finally sat and glanced back at the cell door. Mr. Sarcasm was gone. Great, now he's getting paranoid.

The commercial ended and the anchorman started up his early morning news spiel and finally gave Megamind his timeframe back.

 _5:13am Monday, January 28_ _th_

It was Monday, that meant shower day. In 18 more minutes Warden would come and Megamind would be escorted to the maximum security showers and given 40 minutes to shower and shave before the other maximum security prisoner's shower block which started at 6:30am. He definitely needed the shave; he's not sure what he looked like, but he felt scruffy.

Why did time pass so slowly when he really needed to just get something over with? He drummed his fingers on the armrest staring blankly at the news report.

"Up against the wall, Megamind!"

Fucking finally! Megamind complied, though to his immense displeasure it was the contemptuous Mr. Sarcasm that entered to cuff him. Getting manhandled by the man was quickly turning an already uncomfortable situation into a mortifying one. They marched Megamind out of his cell, with Mr. Sarcastic-Jack-Ass tugging on Megamind's chains at random intervals just to make him stumble. Officer What's-It-Rodney wielding the Taser in the rear, and Mr. No-Nonsense leading this wonderful dream team. With Warden nowhere in sight. This morning was shaping up to be glorious.

Warden was just going to be meeting them at the showers, he had to be. Maybe a meeting ran long?

As the entered the grim white tiled shower room, there was still no Warden. Officer Rodney took up position to the left of the barred metal door, Mr. No-Nonsense on the right, both with Tasers drawn and ready. Megamind felt numb as Mr. Sarcasm uncuffed him. This was wrong, this was all wrong!

"Where's Warden?" Megamind couldn't help the tremble of fear that creeped into his voice.

Mr. Sarcastic, whose badge read 'Office Loong', smirked, "Haven't got a clue in that giant head of yours, do ya? Special treatment time is over, blue boy."

"If you ask me, Warden Woodridge is still too lenient with him," Mr. No-Nonsense scowled, scorn radiating from him.

Oh fuck, this was bad.

"Well, get on with it! We don't have all day." Officer What-a-Twat Rodney piped up.

Fuck. Megamind glared at his own hands as he moved them up to the buttons of his orange jumpsuit. They were shaking. Don't show fear. This was what all the prison's inmates went through. If he showed fear, he showed weakness. They **would** use that knowledge to hurt him more. Never show weakness. He was a fucking super villain. He tried to stead his breathing, slow his frantic heart.

He was having a panic attack.

Just ignore the guards, they don't exist. Didn't matter if he could feel them, didn't matter if their frustration and disgust radiated off them filling his senses; **ignore them**.

Megamind shed the jumpsuit and his simple brown prison issue boots, leaving him only in the plain white tank top and underwear that he was always wore in prison because they were just more comfortable than the normal options. His back was too the guards, but they would notice, even perfectly straight men looked at each other even when they claimed otherwise. Megamind's hands trembled as he dropped his underwear to the floor, being painfully self-conscious about not bending as he did so. He pulled off his undershirt and stepped forward leaving his underwear behind, his very obviously women's underwear, his size XS women's panties behind on the floor.

He walked stiffly to the showers, amusement, bafflement, disgust, and curiosity flowing in his wake. It didn't matter that he was male, didn't matter that he had facial hair now, nothing changed. Megamind tried to summon anger to still his trembling as he yanked the knob around causing the showerhead above him to sputter to life. He looked female by human standards. That's all anyone seemed to care about. His tentacles when not engorged with blood during arousal were folded neatly between his legs and tucked inside him. The result made him look like a prepubescent girl. The Neanderthals of this horrible planet went to great length to make sure he knew that this was a bad thing to look like. Washing himself mechanically, Megamind continued to breath. Deep even breaths. It would all be over soon and he'd be back in his cell.

Considering how he looks, Megamind was eternally grateful that his skin color made Warden and Dr. Zither unconsciously label him as male; the fact that his tentacles were easily excited when he was little helped too. The good doctor had just assumed that was the blue boy's penis equivalent, which was sort of right, but not really. He turned off the cold water sputtering down on him and moved to the sink and mirror. He could hear one of the guards snickering behind him.

There was a razor waiting for him at the sink and as he looked up into the mirror, Megamind got his first look at himself since he'd arrived in the prison. He ran his hand over his face, his rough beard. He looked like his father. The same long angular face and narrow chin. Though his eyes were his mother's brilliant green, with her more delicate nose as well.

Megamind gathered the foamy soap, which was as close to shaving cream as he could get here, and lathered his face. His right eye was still purple and deep navy, an ugly bruise, but the swelling was nearly gone. The cuts on his face were healing nicely and they may not even leave noticeable scars. He shaved carefully trying not to reopen those cuts. Megamind pauses then he's left with just a full goatee, He looked so much like his father, his heart throbbed and he closed his eyes to steady himself. After trimming the goatee down to his trademark stripe, he rinsed off his face and turned toward the waiting guards and his clean cloths.

As Megamind neared the bench where a clean jumpsuit and underclothes were folded neatly waited for him, the sarcastic Officer Loong stepped forward aggression pouring off of him. Behind him Officer Rodney held Megamind's discarded underwear, stretching the elastic and wearing a self-righteous grin and quirking an eyebrow.

Oh evil gods no.

This was why the Warden was always the one to supervise Megamind in the shower. This was why the Warden was **supposed** to be here, not these clowns. Megamind froze in place.

"I think that what is needed here is a full cavity search, don't you agree?" Officer Sarcastic-Jack-Ass stepped closer and Megamind's heart pounded in his ears, "This prisoner always ends up escaping using smuggled contraband. How does he get it? Yet we're forbidden to properly search him. Seems like a pretty big oversight to me."

No.

"Hey Dick, twenty says George finds the contraband in hole number two," the Horrible Twat stage whispered leaning over toward No-Nonsense.

God no.

No-Nonsense Dick just smiles. Righteous cruelty coats the room, seeping into Megamind's skin.

The hammering in his ears drowned out whatever else the beasts before him were saying. Before his eyes memories long suppressed danced before him; another cruel man in a uniform, him naked, pain, humiliation. Megamind jerked backwards.

"Looks like he has something to hide to me. We got ourselves probable cause."

The back of Megamind's heel hit the drain grate of the shower, he hadn't even realized that he'd been slowly retreating in his panic. This wasn't 8 years ago, this wasn't that monster. That bastard was dead. His Uncles had made sure of that. Megamind wasn't a boy anymore; he was a fucking **super villain**. Adrenaline raged through him. He wasn't defenseless this time; a man couldn't fight his way to the top of the pecking order in the prison yard or the criminal underworld without knowing how to fight dirty.

Keep the man's guard down. Megamind widened his eyes, eyebrows raised high. As he stepped back again he let himself stumble, arms thrown wide. Breathed short and sharp; eyes darting back and forth as if looking for escape. The Jack-Ass was smugly confidant as he strode onto the grate. Mr. No-Nonsense Dick and Twat-Rodney were still at the door, relaxed as could be. Perfect. The Jack-Ass still had his Taser on his belt, he hadn't drawn it. Megamind took another half step back, bare feet on rough grating as Jack-Ass stepped onto slippery wet tile.

As the man was in mid step, Megamind lunged forward knocking Jack-Ass's foot out from under him. The blue man twisted allowing the officer's own weight and momentum to drop him to the ground. Bearing down on him, Megamind yanked the Taser from the man's belt with one hand with his other he took a handful of the man's hair and used his leverage to slam Jack-Ass George's face hard into the tile with a satisfying crunch.

Megamind rolled to his feet in a crouch. Officers Rodney and Dick moved to flank him, Tasers drawn. He'd have to be quick. They were already shouting for back-up. If he could take them both out, he could use there keys and… and what fight his way out butt naked?

Fuck.

No-Nonsense Dick lunged forward and Megamind ducked low, driving his stolen Taser into the man's guts. He tried to roll Dick's weight off of him and twist to catch Rodney's attach, but his damp skin and his physical contact with the officer left the shocks of the Taser dancing into his own flesh, making him movements clumsy. Megamind felt the points of Rodney's Taser bite into his bare back; his muscles spasmed dropping him to the floor.

"You little blue freak!"

The embodiment of rage in the form of Officer Rodney loomed over him, a knee pressed hard into his spine as Megamind's arms were forced behind his back. As the hand cuffs clicked into place he could hear the groans from the Jack-Ass.

"Mudda fucka broke by nose!"

With his cheek ground into the tile Megamind could just see Jack-Ass pushing himself to his feet, blood dripping between fingers clasped to his face.

"Hod im still, Ron'ey" Jack-Ass's muffled words were punctuated by his fist pounding into his open palm.

Worse. The Twat Rodney hauled Megamind up to his knees, an arm tight against his throat in a chokehold. This was far worse. Officer Dick was coming to beside them and behind the shower doors opened and the sound of reinforcements entering.

"What the hell is going on here?" thank evil heaven, the Old Man's voice sounds like a choir of angles.

"The prisoner attacked use, Sir!" Rodney barked into Megamind's ear, his arm still tight on Megamind's throat.

"By nose, Thir!" the Jack-Ass's face really was quite messed up, his nose cocked to the side and blood streaming down into his dark mustache. He glared down at Megamind as he spoke, the brown of his eyes looking black, resonating with his unbridled rage.

Megamind tried desperately to catch his Old Man's eyes, the pressure on his windpipe keeping him from making anything other than choking gasping noises. Around him Twat and Dick were explaining their version of events, Jack-Ass adding his slurred comments about how Megamind supposedly was trying to smuggle contraband in an orifice. When Megamind did finally lock gazes with the Warden, the man's eyes were hard and cold.

"Everyone out."

"Sir?" Rodney's voice was baffled, though Megamind could barely feel it through the red burning anger filling the room.

"I said OUT!" Warden snapped, "Megamind's rules are in place for a reason. Now out."

The hold on Megamind's throat lessened as Twat Rodney spoke, "What about the prisoner?"

"I am going to deal with this personally. You are to escort Mr. Loong to the infirmary. Am I understood?"

With a chorus of disgruntled 'yes, Sir's the officers filled out of the shower leaving Megamind gasping for breath on the tile floor, his arms still cuffed behind his back.

"Th'y a'cked me," Megamind gasped out. Catching his breath, he tried again, "Attacked me, defended myself. He threatened me. Please, Warden?" He's not even sure what he's asking for, he just needed the Warden to believe him.

The Old Man closed his eyes, jaw tight, "You attacked and injured guard."

"Please Daddy," he was begging, sobbing on the floor. Or at least what counted as sobbing since he couldn't actually shed tears. Undignified disgrace, what a super villain he made.

Grunting what sounded like a muffled curse, the Warden knelt beside Megamind. The blue man couldn't help but lean against him as the Warden moved to unlock the cuffs. Shakily he grasped the fabric of his Daddy's shirt and buried his face in his Old Man's chest.

"Please"

"Damn it, Blue," he felt the arms wrap around him, holding him. The brush of whiskers and the Warden's lips on the top of his head, "If you're lying to me…"

Megamind pulled back, "I'm not! I swear! That ass, George Loong, he was going to- threatened to-" He couldn't even say it, he choked on the words, he was pathetic, "They were just going to let him, making bets. Just watching…"

Warden stared hard at him before signing and standing up, "I can suspend Mr. Loong for breaking protocol, but you attacked prison officers, Blue. I can't overlook that."

"But… but they were going to…"

The Warden of Metro City Prison took a deep breath and looked away from the blue man at his feet, "twelve hours in solitary, Megamind, and that's being lenient."

"…I'm already in solitary…" This wasn't happening; this was all just a horrible nightmare.

"No, you're not. Get dressed."

Megamind dressed in a numb daze. He couldn't even look at Warden, the disappointment and frustration embodying the man making Megamind feel like had had on his last day of school after the blue paint incident. It seemed in his Daddy's eyes he wasn't even allowed to defend himself from abusers. He wanted to be angry at the Old Man, but he just felt like dirt.

"Do you have contraband on you?" the Warden's voice was softer, sounded like he was trying to be sympathetic, but Megamind couldn't sense anything through the sharp tang of anger and frustration and disappointment. An act then, or at least not quite genuine.

"I don't, I wouldn't, not there," and he wouldn't, ever. As much as Megamind loved to flaunt the rules, there were certain ones he'd never risk breaking. It's also why he'd never used his cell's television in an escape. He'd never wanted to risk the consequences.

Warden seemed satisfied with the answer and retrieved the iron 4-piece and recuffed Megamind's ankles and wrists. Leading him to the door, the Warden rapped on it. Two officers appeared and flanked them as the Warden led Megamind deeper into the prison. To the _hole_.

Megamind felt he should never have woken up today.

One of the guards unlocked the thick metal door, a small movable panel in the center. The room opens up to be a 6 foot by 9 foot rectangle of white bricks. A bed with a thin mattress sat on one side, a simple stained metal toilet beside it with a tiny sink built into the top. Megamind was deposited inside, cuffs removed, and the door slammed shut.

No television. No stupid wall paintings. No chair. He took a few steps forward, wall. Turn, wall; turn, door; turn, bed. His frantic turns brought him to the door again and he pressed his hands against it. The panel was waist height. What did they call this? A cuff point. They'd pass his food through this. It's how normal solitary cells worked if he remembered his Uncle Mickey's ramblings well enough. A cuff point because they'd cuff him through here too, if they needed to open the door.

Twelve hours. If it was after 6:00am now, that meant he wouldn't get out of here until after dinner. He collapsed back on the thin bed, destitute. At least breakfast would be soon and he could silence his stomach's rumbling.

Megamind sat curled up on the thin bed, listening to the noises of the guard outside, his breathing, the squeak of the chair as he shifted his weight. Waiting for the footsteps that would bring food, distraction of any kind. He was finally rewarded as heavy food steps drew near and the panel of the cuff point was opened.

As Megamind approached the door he could hear the sound of something metal being dragged across concrete. He ducked peeking through the open slot. In front of the door a large officer held a plastic tray over a metal trash can. The man locked eyes with Megamind and tipped the tray, the contents spilling into the waiting can.

"Wow, looks like the prisoner sure was hungry. Cleaned his plate just like that." The sound of snapping fingers punctuating the door guards words. The one holding the tray just grinned, smug bastard.

Megamind didn't even know these men. They might not have even like the Ass George, but with one egregious action Megamind had made enemies with the entirety of the prison's correctional officers. Officer solidarity, attack one and they all respond. The panel was snapped shut in his face.

He slammed his fists against the door in frustration. Damn everything on this stupid miserable rock of a planet. He curled himself back up on the mattress, wrapping his thin arms around his growling stomach. Megamind has been hungrier than this, but it'd been years. He'd forgotten just how miserable it was; his guts turning in on themselves around the hollow void in his middle. Consuming all this thoughts.

The bed was as thin and hard as the one he'd first owned. The first one that he could say was really his because he'd claimed it from a junkyard and Minion had hauled it all the way back to the ruined office building they were squatting in. It had smelled and the springs had jabbed into his back, but it was better than sleeping in the dirt with only thin blankets like he had the four days before. He'd been hungry then too. Hungry enough to eat the expired can of condensed soup they'd found. Just eaten it straight out of the can, cold. Minion had been eating the rats they'd managed to catch. Alive. Megamind loved his dear fishy friend like a brother, but he hadn't been able to watch that. Or look at a rat the same way.

Was this better or worse? Worse, he decided. If he was going to starve, he'd rather starve as a free man. Megamind curled in on himself. Thoughts sinking and the seconds slowly ticking past with each breath.

One false alarm later, that had just been the changing of the guard shift, footsteps finally neared the cell door again. Please let this one not be an asshole.

The cuff point's panel slid open and a tray was pushed through. Megamind grabbed it eagerly and returned to the bed. His brief spike in mood quickly evaporated, though. What lay on the tray was a brick of something. It was firm to the touch and smelled strange. Outside he could hear the guards sniggering. Megamind broke a corner off and brought it to his tongue. It tasted disgusting.

"Enjoying your nutraloaf, super villain? Compliments of George"

When he got out of here… when he got out of here he was cubing every last fucking one of them. When he got out… he could still get out… it was just going to be harder than usual. A lot harder. Oh god.

Minion, that fantastic fish, would come up with something if Megamind couldn't follow through with the plan. He'd still get out. It was going to be ok.

He choked down the loaf just to fill the void in his stomach and drown the lingering taste in water. It didn't help. He shoved the tray back at the guard outside, but refused to dignify their cruelty with a further response. Further antagonizing them would bring him nothing but more pain.

Megamind paced in a tight circle. Lunch meant his punishment was half over. Though said lunch was trying to come back up. He fell back on the bed; at least that _food_ filled him enough that he could focus his thoughts again.

Closing his eyes, Megamind tried to conjure up memories of home; warm lights, soft mechanical hums, the sound of Minion singing in the background. The cold hard bed and his own misery drug him away from such happy thoughts. Instead he plunged into memory.

The wind howled around him. It was January and winter still held the city in its icy grip. The desecrated mattress Megamind laid on poked him even through the layers of shirts and coats that buried his thin frame. He was filthy, didn't know the last time he'd been clean. Minion blocked the gap in the wall with his large metal body, trying to keep out the wind and the snow drifts that followed.

This was ridiculous. There had to be a better way than this! He had money. Warden had helped him submit patents on some of his least dangerous his ideas, unique computer chips and small tech items, they produced a steady trickle of money into his bank account. An account no one would let him touch. He didn't have an I.D. and he was a minor even if he did. They didn't care if that money was his. Wouldn't even listen to him, just chased the _freak_ out of the bank.

He'd seen the other homeless pan handle. Some of them seemed to do fairly well. People crossed the street or sped away the moment they saw his blue skin. Even when he had money, it was usually worthless. Few would take it. Most cashiers acted like they'd catch the plague from touching anything he tried to give them. So everything he owned, they'd stolen or scavenged from the refuse of others. Even the other forgotten destitute of Metrocity's streets avoided the alien duo.

Frustrated, Megamind rose, he was sick of stinking and freezing. There was seedy motel only a block away; it had showers, heaters, a real bed. He roused Minion and they made their way through the shadows of the alleys. Minion was wrapped in a trench coat and a blanket to hide his robotic body. His heater was running at full capacity, powered my Megamind's binky. Minion's disguise would never be able to fool the desk person; Megamind would have to go in alone.

He stood at the corner, stamping his feet in his oversized boots, trying desperately to get feeling back in his toes. The young blue alien was shrouded in layers of overlarge shirts topped with a puffy jacket. The hood pulled over his large blue dome looked ridiculous, but it hid the blue. A red wool scarf wrapped around his neck and pulled up over his nose. Maybe if no one looked too close they wouldn't notice the blue.

As he stood there a woman approached, "Hey there honey, looking for a good time?"

He turned to her in surprise; she must be freezing, she was barely wearing anything. Her long legs were exposed with nothing more covering them than net patterned socks that disappeared into a skirt so short that it was hardly more than a tube of yellow cloth. Her only concession to the weather was a fur coat which hung open revealing that her shirt too was woefully inadequate to protect her from the winter chill, another tube of cloth that just covered her breasts, leaving her belly open to the freezing wind.

"Just looking to get warm," Megamind mumbled shifting uneasily. She didn't feel hostile or even curious.

"I can get you all kinds of warm, baby," her voice came out stilted and her eyelashes fluttered oddly. She must be suffering from the cold, exposed as she was.

Megamind glanced at the entry to the motel again, an idea forming. If he could get this woman to help him get the key, the man inside was far less likely to ask awkward questions to this obviously human woman than he was to the blue boy hidden in layers of fabric. He'd found out the hard way that people grew very suspicious when they couldn't see someone's face. It must be to do with humans using facial recognition to convey emotion, Megamind supposed. Human tended to assume someone was hiding something or lying if they hid their face and thus their emotions.

"I want to get a room," he told the frozen woman, pointing to the motel. He wasn't really sure what to say to convince her to help. Maybe he could bribe her?

"Mmmmm, sure thing, honey. You got the cash?"

This was going so much easier them he could ever have hoped. He pulled out the wad of bills from the depths of his coat.

"I don't know how much…" he trailed off. He hates not knowing such basic things.

She took the money from his hands, flipping through the bills nodding, "Lead the way, sugar."

When they entered, Megamind ducked his head low with his shoulders hunched, glancing at the rough man behind the motel's counter through the matted fuzzy trim of his coat's hood. The woman took the lead, approaching the counter like she'd done this a million times.

"A room for us, Bill," she leaned on the counter, her voice still pitched strangely.

Scorn permeated the air around the man, but he pulled a key card out, "How many hours?"

Hours? Megamind thought they rented these places by the day, no matter. "Four should be plenty."

The man scoffed, "Big spender, here."

The woman seemed a bit surprised, but she passed the man a number of the bills and stuffed the rest into her tight fitting top. Megamind followed her as she led the way up a rickety stairway and slid the keycard to open a door.

Megamind toured the room quickly, pressing his hands down on the bed. It had a very satisfying spring to it. Everything was stained and dirty, but not nearly as much as the filth he had been sleeping in. He grinned through the scarf. As he moved to tug the scratchy wool thing down, he realized the woman was still there. Staring at him.

He shifted uncomfortably, "Umm, you aren't needed anymore?" that sounded rude, "Thank you for your assistance."

"You paid for four hours, hon." She gestured to the bills sticking from her top.

"Your bribe."

"Bribe?" she arched a sculpted eyebrow at him. Seeing her in the light, she hardly looked much older than him. The makeup she worn made her features more dramatic, giving the illusion of an older woman instead of a girl.

"Yes, to not tell anyone…" Megamind swallowed, he knew this had all been going too smoothly to trust, "that's how bribes work."

She leaned back on the wall, scrutinizing him, "how old are you anyway?" She felt… guilty?

"Eighteen," Megamind replied automatically.

"Yeah, and so am I," she crossed her arms, looking down at her shoes, dangerously tall high heel things. "Look, do you mind if I just stay up here anyway? It's cold and my pimp'll get suspect if I come down right away."

Pimp? Megamind looked at her again. Dark circles were just noticeable under the pale concealer around her eyes, the blue of them dull and lifeless. Her blond hair was the result of bleaching, the roots showing dark brown growing in. Her arms, crossed in front of her showed track marks on her inner arm. Under the bright red lipstick, her lips were cracked and drawn. A mental picture formed from stories overheard from prison inmates.

"You're a whore?"

"What did you think I was?" her voice was flat; the pretense that had given her voice the strange cadence was gone. She felt broke, hopeless. As hopeless as he felt out here in this atrocity of a city.

Megamind shrugged, "just don't tell anyone, ok?"

He begun tugging off the layers of cloths, he was getting far too warm now. He waited for the shriek as blue skin appeared, but it never came. He looked over to the wall to find that she had sunk down and was sitting on the floor, her knees drawn up revealing a flash of red fabric between her legs.

"What's you name anyway?" she wasn't even looking at him, barely even acknowledged him.

This was ok, he relaxed, "Megamind, yours?"

She snorted, " _Candy_."

Sarcasm. Whatever, he ignored her and moved onto the mission's goal. He stripped down to a thin green t-shirt and a pair of black boxers we wore as shorts and made his way to the shower. The water was wonderfully hot. He scrubbed himself until his skin was sore and flushed pink. It was a shame to have to put his filthy cloths back on, but he did anyway. There just wasn't time to clean them, too.

Returning to the main room, he flopped bonelessly onto the bed. He could still get a good couple hours sleep in. Warm and on a real bed. She was looking at him again though.

"What?" he snapped, she was ruining his revelry.

"Why do _you_ need a stage name? That's what that is, isn't it? Megamind?"

"It's my name!" he spat, indignant, "I'm going to be a super villain. It's my destiny."

"Destiny," she barked a harsh laugh and continued, her voice flat and knowing, "It sucks, doesn't it?"

Megamind deflated under her gaze, "yeah… guess it does."

They just sat in silence for a time; listening the howl of the winter storm blowing outside.

"It's Blue, Syx Blue," he's not sure why he told her.

Something about this moment was like staring into a broken mirror and it disturbed him. Yet it was comforting too, having someone to commiserate with, who really knew just how cruel this world was.

"Sarah Mundell, nice to meet ya, Blue."

And just like that, they were friends. The rest of their time disappeared as Sarah told him about the gangs that ran in this area of the city. Which group was moving into power, what drugs were selling. Who was who, and who just that they were someone. She taught him the street signs, the codes written into the graffiti. As she spoke her face slowly came alive.

When the four hours was up, they parted in front of the motel. Sarah moved back to her spot on the corner and Megamind made to disappear into the alley to go find Minion and regale him with all the info he'd gathered. As Megamind turned to give Sarah one last wave, he was just in time to see a man slap her, dropping her to the icy slush of the street.

He was moving before he was even aware; his hand moving to draw his de-gun… but it was in pieces, gutted for the binky to heat Minion's suit. Minion, however, must have been waiting for him. His fantastic fish appeared at his side, a looming shadow of metal.

The man, her pimp Megamind assumed, raised his fist again. His back was to Megamind and Minion, it was child's play. Minion's large metal hand encapsulated the man's fist, and Minion squeezed.

"It's not nice to hit people on the ground, mister," Minion, ever so polite.

"Fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck!"

"My, my, Minion! He seems absolutely beside himself. He must by an adoring fan!" Megamind said brightly. His nerves made him jittery, he threw himself into the role; weaving anxiety into bravado.

"Hmm, I'm not sure, Sir. I don't think he even knows your name." Minion squinted at the man, making sure to flash plenty of sharp teeth as he spoke.

"Oh nonsense, Min-yon! He's just been struck dumb by meeting such a celebrity in person. We'll just have to remind him. Isn't that right, my dear man?" Megamind leered down on him, where the man shook, his arm still raised and locked in Minion's grip.

A whimper was the man's only response, and radiating fear and horror. Excellent. Keep it going, mustn't let his own fear show through.

"You see, what we have here is a grave misunderstanding. This," Megamind waved encompassingly around himself, "is my territory. And this fine lady was keeping me company. What I do not allow, in my territory, is the harm of what is mine. Do you understand? Whimper pathetically if you do?" he continued without giving the disgraceful man a moment, "If you wish to continue you operation with in my territory, you may do so by all means. There are however, rules."

He was pacing, running his mouth stream of consciousness, but these were all things he'd been thinking about, even if he was only now giving them voice. His talk with Sarah now spurred his thoughts with more confidence, "You operate in my domain, I take a cut. I'm not an unreasonable man, ten percent, off the top. You do **not** beat your girls, and neither do the clients. Rape is **not** tolerated, period, neither are pedophiles. See," Megamind spread his arms and smiles widely, "simple rules."

"Wha… who the fuck…" It seemed the man found his voice again.

"I'm sorry, introductions must have slipped my mind. Megamind, master of all villainy. And don't worry about finding me to make your payments. I'll find you." He poured ever once of menace he could into those words. Already he could see Minion placing a tracker inside the man's sleeve, "And if you touch _Candy_ again, well… Minion here sometimes forgets his strength."

Minion squeezed again and Megamind could hear bones snapping before Minion released the pathetic pimp. The man fled, glaring back at the two aliens and Sarah who was standing on the curb now, watching.

"Wish you hadn't gone and done that. He'll be worse now."

"No, he won't. Super Villains don't make idle threats," he'll have to follow through and it's going to be messy, but the only way to earn the respect of hard jaded men of this city was to be the one on top. By whatever means. If prison had taught him anything, it had taught him that.

It was years before Megamind saw Sarah again. He hadn't even recognized her, but she certainly remembered him. He'd been fleeing Metro Man after another failed battle when a woman in the doorway of a massage parlor waved him inside. He'd followed, sensing no ill intentions; waiting quietly until Metro Man had gone past.

"Remember me, Blue?" she'd said and reintroduced herself as Mistress Mundell.

She owned this parlor, a cover for what was essentially a brothel. But the girls were happy, or as much as anyone stuck in this line of work could be. She told him about how he'd changed her life that day. That destiny, she discovered, wasn't just what you were forced into, but what you reshaped it to be. She told him about how his rules, which had been given many additions over the years, had reshaped the city around him. His neighborhoods were safer, the shops he protected cheaper and better stocked, the drugs sold on his streets not cut with poison. About how being poor were he existed, no longer meant the certainty of misery. Crime flourished, but only those types of crime that Megamind deemed ethical even if unlawful. And the city flourished and grew, without misery and despair ruling their lives the people in the 'blue sectors' could aspire to better themselves. Sarah smiled at him, her face healthy and alive and she became the first woman to join the ranks of his Uncles. She became Aunt Sarah.

She'd be out there now, going about business; making sure her corner of the city ran smoothly, keeping the pimps in line and funneling money through her massage parlors. Megamind's territory was so large now that he and Minion could never control it alone, even with the Brain Bots. He relied on his Uncles, his Family, to mind their areas of expertise. They kept him informed, brought to his attention matters he needed to deal with directly, but he was more than happy with this arrangement. Megamind had no desire to spend all his time arguing with drug dealers or pimps or wannabe gun runners. Much needed money trickled in and he trusted his Uncles and Aunt to represent his wishes.

It had all gotten so big without his ever even realizing it, and here he was having already made plans to push his territory out further into the Parks neighborhood. Megamind sighed, stretching out on the thinly padded bed. It could hardly be helped.

Was it dinner time yet, it had to be didn't it? How much time had passed while he was reliving old memories? Only two hours… and minutes… maybe? Crap, he was losing it. Hours left to go at the very least. Frustrated he tried to sleep.

Every minute dragged itself out into its own tiny eternity, but finally the cuff point in this hell's door opened again and another tray of nutraloaf was pushed in. Megamind sighed, resigned, at least he'd be returned to his normal cell soon. Gagging he forced this second loaf down as well, returned the tray and waited.

And waited.

Warden had said only twelve hours. Dinner came at 5:30pm, he should be released from the hole at around 6:00pm. It had to be past that by now.

After what must have been decades a guard finally ordered him to the door and cuffed his hands through the slot. When they opened the cell door they added the rest of the 4-piece, cuffing his ankles, binding his waist. He didn't even care, he was out.

His procession brought him back to his cell with its television, and his chair, and fuck, he's never been so happy to see that damn rainbow mural.

Megamind immediately turned the television on, cranking up the volume. Anything to get out of his own head. Anything to add noise to the world again. Didn't matter what he watched.

The time disappeared too quickly, and long before he was ready, his cage plunged into darkness and Megamind curled back in on himself. It was too soon and far too much for him, this torture.

Minutes passed into hours, his skewed perspective translating their passage into seemingly random intervals, incomprehensible.


	5. Chapter 5 (too long)

Well this took forever and I feel sorely like I missed things I originally wanted in this chapter...but it'd done.

 **I don't own Megamind**

* * *

 _Tuesday Morning_

As the lights flickered on above him, Megamind sat in his chair dreading existence. What new horrors would the swine outside have envisioned for him today? What new cruelties?

"Hey kid! I saw ol' George's face. Oh man, you messed him up good." Nonchalant Hank's warm countenance appeared in his cell door's viewport, "Good on ya, that man is an ass."

Megamind blinked in shock at the officer, and Hank followed with a thumbs-up and a wide bright smile, full of sincerity. Uncertainly, Megamind returned the smile and decided that Hank was indeed his favorite guard. The man was such a laid back sort, some might call lazy, but Megamind just saw an older man who had seen too much in his life to get overly worked up about anything.

As the officer retreated back to his desk, Megamind noticed that Hank's coarse hair was frizzy and wild today, the black of it shot through with gray. Normally that wild hair was kept in neat, tiny braids. The very bald alien was endlessly fascinated by human hair in all the immense varieties it appeared in. The people of this planet spent countless hours obsessing over their hair, creating different fashions and styles, shaping hair, coloring it. Hair was just so erotically exotic to the blue man.

He had to laugh at himself though, despite being a different species, he'd spent nearly his entire life around these hairy humans. What did it say about his psychology that he found hair erotic? Was it a sign that he had integrated mentally into a human mindset, or was the fact that he considered it exotic a sign of his continued alien-ness? Either way, Megamind was painfully aware that his psychology was fucked up.

When he was a young boy, sometimes he imagined that he wasn't the last one. That out there somewhere was a spaceship filled with blue men and women like him. After all if his people had been able to achieve space travel, surely there could have been a large ship that had simply left the dying solar system long before Megamind's small pod had narrowly escaped. If they were out there, somewhere, they would surely be looking for a new home. The young blue boy had longed for them to come and take him away into a world of acceptance and love, where his needs and desires weren't strange or awkward, and where there were no 'time outs' where you had to stand in a corner and think about what you'd done.

That dream had been shattered the day that Megamind had watched a documentary about a lion reserve. The special had followed a pride of lions that had adopted a hyena. The hyena had joined the pride as a pup and acted like a lion, hunted with the lions, played with the lions. The pride that had adopted it treated the hyena-like a member of the pride, but as its lowest member. The lions knew that the hyena was, in fact, a hyena, but it wasn't clear if the hyena knew that.

They had shown clips on the hyena trying to interact with another pride in the reserve and getting chased off and attacked. Yet the little hyena had been stubborn. It keeps trying, in seeming confusion as its fellow lions kept driving it off. Tragically, the narrator had added, they couldn't just take the hyena and put it with a hyena clan. This mentally messed up little hyena didn't actually know how to be a hyena. It only knew how to be a lion, even if it wasn't very good at it.

Megamind had seen himself in that screwed up hyena. If he ever did meet more of his species, if there were any others out there; would they even want him? Would he even be able to understand them or know how to interact with them?

His parents had sent Minion with the young boy as his guardian, his information tool. The had filled the little ichthyoid's altered mind with everything they could think of, passing on the knowledge and advice they thought necessary for their child who would be forced to grow up without them. But Minion hadn't been able to talk yet, hadn't been able to ask questions, just absorb. Because of Minion's three months with mother and father, Megamind had a basic understanding of his people's language; hardly better than a child's understanding, though. He knew so little of the culture of the blue planet, Minion's experiences being limited to a tank in one room of his parent's living space. They had told Minion so much… but both Minion and Megamind had grown up on Earth, their knowledge of culture and social interactions based on human behaviors.

So much of what Megamind's parents had deemed so important to pass on through Minion was incomprehensible. There was nothing on Earth that the words could reference in context and without that the words were nearly meaningless without ideas to attach to them. Things that were so important to the blue people and Megamind couldn't even grasp what they were about. Some had seemed to do with social interactions, some biological; either way, it didn't make a difference, they'd never been able to puzzle out all the meanings. All while Megamind and Minion had so many vital questions, the answers to which had been seemingly left out. Questions they had about how family structure worked for the blue race, how his people bonded, questions about their psychology and biology… things that his parents had obviously thought so universal or basic as to not need to be mentioned. Or maybe they had, but it was so far outside of what it was to be human that the answers were part of the unintelligible jumble.

So where the hyena acted like a lion, Megamind knew he was essentially human, at least mentally. However, with the exception of those who raised him and the few unique individuals who could look past his blue skin and see the man inside, he would always be an outsider. Even if he found more blue people, he'd still be an outsider.

The arrival of his breakfast roused him from his sober thoughts. Slid through the slot again. As much as the guards of this prison were more often than not antagonistic jerks, Megamind still longed for even that brief contact with the world that the process of them entering his cell had previously allowed him.

Sighing in resignation Megamind rose and retrieved his breakfast, pleased to find it was a normal prison meal. He brought the tray, actual plastic this time, back to his chair. Breakfast today appeared to be an orange, more instant oatmeal artificial apple flavored, nearly burnt toast, butter and grape jelly, thick black tar of coffee, and orange juice just to be redundant he supposed. After immediately pouring out the coffee, he dug into the rest of the meal. They even gave him an actual plastic spork this time. What a novelty, he felt almost like a real person.

Megamind turned his attention to the morning news to try and lift his glum thoughts. They were showing coverage of the US 31 overpass clean up. Emergency crews from the state had been brought in the help assist as traffic into and out of the city had become gridlocked on the detour roads.

Destruction Worker had very much succeeded in causing immense chaos even if he had gotten himself landed in jail. Megamind was sure he'd be out eventually, though. The prison system might as well be a revolving door it was so broken. Actually, he might be able to work the fact that the destructive maniac was locked up here too into the escape plan. 145b relied on causing a minor riot as a distraction for the prep stage. He's sure he could convince the crazed buffoon of a man to raise holy hell if he could bring Destruction Worker some tools.

The problem, though, was what it had been since Megamind got here; communicating with the rest of the prison population. There had to be a solution.

As Megamind stewed on his dilemma, the coverage continued. The death toll had increased as four of the seriously injured had passed away last night, bringing the total to eight with three of them being children. The anchorwoman talked about services being held for the families, trying to be cheery and serious at the same time.

"Reaching out to all those affected by this tragedy, the Scott family has generously donated to the rebuilding project and the memorial for those lives lost in this catastrophe. Joining us is Lord Scott's son, the rarely seen Mr. Wayne Scott."

They were serious. They can't be serious. Literally, Wayne was just wearing a business suit and had styles his gorgeous locks of hair differently. How could even the soft-headed morons of this city not know he was Metro Man? Surely this was in jest and they were humoring the billionaire family.

"Ah, heh…. well, thank you for having me. I just want all the citizens of Metro City to know just how deeply move I am… ah… that we are, by what happened. We just want to do what we can to help support those families who've lost loved ones… and to get this great city back on its feet," Wayne rambled, rubbing his neck. His trademark charming grin more awkward and somber than normal.

Wayne was so painfully uncomfortable in his non-heroic persona. He looked good in the suit though. Well, Megamind had to admit to himself, Wayne looked good in everything. It was unfair how effortlessly gorgeous the larger alien was. It made Megamind even more painfully aware of his own features. Both aliens were disproportionate by human standards, however, Wayne's over wide shoulders and bulky musculature fit with the idealization of human form. Megamind, with his too large head and thin frame, was far more reminiscent of deformity.

Calling himself incredibly handsome had been Minion's idea. His fishy friend's reasoning was that if Megamind said it enough, he'd start internalizing it. He didn't have the heart to tell Minion that it wasn't really working, so he kept it up; it fit with the boastful persona he'd created. Megamind knew that he would be handsome for his people: his features were symmetrical; his eyes large and bright with full eyelashes; his features strong and masculine even his beard had come in beautifully; his skin was unblemished except for a few scars, but scars were sexy. He's sure he was very beautiful, he just rarely felt it.

On the television, Wayne was still awkwardly over explaining his generous donation. He must still feel guilty about not being able to save those families. It's not that it wasn't a tragic loss of life, but Megamind new firsthand how many people froze to death in Metrocity's streets each year, no one put together a monument for them. At least Wayne was actually doing something and this was definitely Wayne's idea. Megamind took a devious satisfaction knowing Lord Scott must be hating every minute of this. Not that the mega-billionaire didn't dole out to charities, but when he did he always made sure it was high-key and with as much praise and pomp as possible. This was far too low-key for anything Lord Scott would engineer.

As the interview continued Megamind tuned out the idle chatter, just analyzing his nemesis. Looking at Wayne like this, it was plain to see that Metro Man was as much a persona to Wayne as Megamind was to Blue. Still didn't excuse the mindless drones' insistence in not recognizing Wayne for who he was.

It was so rare that Megamind ever got the chance to see Wayne out-of-character though. Even when they were back in the old schoolhouse, Wayne had already begun adopting the persona that would later become Metro Dude and then Metro Man once he had fully embraced his role as the city's defender. Always showboating and mugging for his audience using his dashing good looks to his advantage.

Wayne Scott, however, was just an uncomfortable man in a suit; even if a devastatingly good looking one. Megamind mused what it would be like to be able to see Wayne like this in person. The man only ever wore a suit when going about his business as a Scott, so it would have to be at a function of some sort, a party maybe. Not that Megamind would ever in his life be invited to something like that. No, he'd have to crash it. But then Wayne would zip off to be Metro Man and that would ruin everything.

Maybe Megamind could sneak in. It wasn't possible to hide his features completely without still drawing attention to himself. Minion and he had been developing invisibility cloaking technology but it wasn't to the point where it could be easily portable and it drained power insatiably fast. So far it only easily worked on large powered devices, such as his pride and joy Hudson, now dubbed the Invisible Car. So invisibility wouldn't work for sneaking inside. No, if he were to enter a party like that at all it would have to be in full villainous mode…

But this was just fantasy… so he let his mind wander down impossible paths.

It would be some sort of fundraiser event, that's what rich families like the Scotts did wasn't it? So the Yong Mr. Scott would be in attendance, dressed in a fine suit. Would it be white like his costume or formal black? With a growing grin, Megamind decided on black. The 24-year-old hero would have that nervous look on him, his large shoulders hunched as if he could ever hide in the crowd. As if he wasn't like a god walking among them.

What would Megamind be wearing? His villainous attire? Well, he didn't even own a suit so he supposed he would have to be. It would hardly due to show up at a fancy party in jeans and a biker jacket or anything else he had in his closet back at Evil Lair. But he could have a suit, couldn't he? Something slick with electric blue and… and… a little mask. Just to be coy. There was no hiding who he was, but for the feel of the thing.

So he would saunter up as if he belonged in this rich world, all the eyes following him. Catch the hero unaware, he'd snag a drink off a table and muse at how lovely a party it was. He'd get the chance to really admire Wayne in his suit, the fine cut of it. Megamind imagined Wayne being so startled that he'd spew his drink, turning to stare owlishly at Megamind. Maybe Wayne would even try and play it cool for a while and they could talk. They'd fight of course, in the end, but Wayne would keep that delicious suit on and maybe it would get torn up a bit during the fight. Megamind's would have a secret change, turning the coat into his trademark cape.

Megamind's hand wandered down between his legs. He hadn't masturbated this much, so close together, in his life. Was something wrong with him or was it just the boredom of this place? Or age? He'd assumed puberty had long passed him, but who really knew.

He shook the thought from his head and continued his daydream. Wayne's rough hands on him as he hauled Megamind to his feet were always treasured memories. He wove those into his daydream, Wayne pulling him close as they tussled until he could feel the larger man's breath on his skin. Megamind shivered at the thought and he ground into his palm.

Distracted as he was, Megamind jerked when the guard started hammering on his cell door. Sucking in a breath so hard that he choked on the spit he inhaled.

"Return your tray now prisoner!" the man shouted, it was the Twat.

Megamind stilled, eyes closed, and focused on just breathing; his memories still too fresh.

"If you don't return your tray immediately then you will be actively attempting to retain contraband and disobeying a correctional officer. I'll be authorized to call for physical force to remove it from your cell." The Twat Rodney ground out with vindictive glee.

His limbs moving more like an awkward marionette, Megamind scooped his forgotten tray up and nudged it under the door and through the open slot with his foot before carefully tottering backward into his chair. Smooth as fuck, that was, he berated himself. He gripped his knees with relentless force and he fought not to curl up. He had not been mentally prepared for this.

With a snort, the Twat left, assumedly with the forfeited tray. Megamind hadn't eaten all that much. Not that it mattered now. The television played on and he turned his focus to it once more, trying desperately to calm his frantic heart.

Lunch came and went with Megamind still staring glassy-eyed at the television, arms curled around his knees. He ate more because he knew he should then out of real hunger. Logically he knew that he was hungry, should feel hungry, and Minion would be cross with him if he didn't eat. So he did.

When the tray was returned and the officer had left, No-Nonsense Dick who at least had the decency to continue to be as grimly professional as ever, Megamind stretched and tested his left ankle. It was still sore, but he could move fairly easily now if he didn't push himself. The cracked ribs, less so, they had been healing fairly well until the knee in his back had set everything off again. He hadn't felt it much yesterday, but now he could.

Regardless, he couldn't just keep sitting around feeling sorry for himself and lapsing into inactivity. His solitary confinement was doing enough to drive him to the brink of insanity as it was. Activity would help.

Pacing himself, Megamind slowly began an exercise routine. Stretching out his limbs and limbering up to test his range of movement. He'd worsened so many of his healing injuries during that brief battle in the shower. Still, it wasn't so bad. He'd be able to run when the time came for it, he's sure. Pacing his cell at a brisk walk he began what exercising his body would allow. It passed the time if nothing else.

Exercise completed and television nothing but garbage and drivel, the passage of the hours crept in on him. Megamind's hands twitched. He needed outside of this cell. Desperately so. By the time the shift rotation brought him the Cowboy, Megamind thought he might have a plan. Moving up to the door, he pressed his hand against the glass.

"Pssst, hey McKinley, right?" Megamind hissed through the door, tapping it with his knuckles when the boy didn't respond, "Hey."

A loud groan was his response from Fraidy-Cat, "I'm not even supposed to talk to you. Are you trying to get me in trouble with the Warden again man?"

The boy's red-headed visage appeared in the view portal regardless, his arms crossed and jaw set stubbornly.

Megamind tried a charming grin, "We got off on the wrong foot my dear man," the kid didn't seem to be buying the grin. The blue alien groaned and slid down the door, "I'm dying. This is inhuman. I need a smoke. For all the justice that might exist in your heart. Just a smoke and to see the sky," he clasped his hands before him, begging.

Officer McKinley looked exasperated, "No yard time, that's the Warden's orders, man."

"Look, I'll owe you. You can do the full three-man escort and everything. Leave me in chains the whole time! Just ten minutes outside, please!" Megamind turned the full force of his green eyes on the young man.

"Owe me? You're in prison. For life," Cowboy all but rolled his eyes at the villain.

Megamind snorted, "For how long? Oh, maybe a few week at tops. I aaaall-ways escape, my good man," he tapped the glass with his pointer finger, eyebrows raised, "And when I do, I'll owe you. You have my word."

The young officer shifted, face slipping through emotions as he worked through the truth of the super villain's statements. The fact that Megamind always escaped was the whole reason behind the increased security measures after all…

"You stay in chains and if you do anything suspicious than I won't hesitate to tase you," he snapped, attempting to look far tougher than he was.

Megamind nearly laughed but he was far too relieved. He held his hands up and stepped back from the door, "No funny business."

"Smokes are contraband you know," McKinley grumbled as he got on the com, but he made a call as he turned his back to the cell.

Megamind waited impatiently, leg bouncing. He'd nearly feared that the Fraidy-Cat had backed out of the deal when the shout came through for him to assume the position. After he had done so, the door opened and the smell of nerves and curiosity slammed into him. Shaking, he'd been so starved for contact, he nearly welcomed the contact that came with the irons. The guards were new, too. All but the Cowboy. His friends? Must be. The blue genius filed away their faces for later.

The march to the yard was nearly silent, heads held high and chains taunt. Cowboy… McKinley managed to impress Megamind with the sharp way he snapped orders at the guards they passed, making them believe this charade was routine. And then… then… the sky.

Megamind fell back on the pavement as soon as they let him stop, just staring up at the darkening sky. He hadn't even known how late it had been. The sun sinking low and casting the sky orange and red. That actually made his plan easier, but that was hardly important in this moment.

Fresh AIR! He sucked in lungful after lungful of sweet freedom. As close as he'd come in days.

"So do I get the smoke?" he asked, rolling his head towards the guard nearest him.

The man snorted and handed over a cigarette after lighting his own, "You're shorter than I pictured."

Megamind raised a brow, accepting the offered cigarette and taking a drag. As awkward as it was with his bound wrists. He blew out a puff of smoke and cupped the glowing end with a hand. He played with the cigarette in his hand, seemingly idly. Hide the glow, reveal, hide, reveal. There would be eyes watching the yard. Minion or a Brain Bot. They'd pick up the code.

Focusing on the guard, his hands repeated the message hidden in his fidgeting, "I thought the line was supposed to be 'aren't you a little short for a stormtrooper?'"

The man laughed and Megamind smiled, god he'd missed social contact.

"Fuck man, I just never thought I'd ever see an honest to god alien up close."

Megamind took another drag from his cigarette, "It's not nearly as glamorous as it looks, believe me."

Still… their exuberance was enjoyable. Even the Cowboy started to relax as Megamind started on a second cigarette.

"So what's with the lightning bolt thing anyway?"

"Eee-leck-tricity, my good man," Megamind chuckled, he wouldn't tell them about the bolt on his baby clothing, "And it just looks cool. Does the reason behind AC/DC's name make them any less or more amazing?"

It had been so easy to start to forget all the strain he'd been other, that when a cough sounded behind him, Megamind froze. His back locking up as his face fell, "…oops."

Warden Woodridge sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, "McKinley, Smith, Douglas… there will be severe repercussions for this. If you wish to avoid them, you are free to turn in your resignation. Now leave."

"Sir!" "Warden!" "We-" the stumbled over themselves.

Megamind turned, jaw set. He looked straight at the Warden even as he spoke to the men who he'd been bonding with, "I promised and I'll keep my word," he'd make this right by them… somehow. Once he got out. He held up his chained wrists to the Warden, "They followed procedure and were in the process on confiscating contraband from my person."

The Warden snorted at the blatant lie and glared at the three officers, "I told you to leave."

"But sir-" McKinley protested and Megamind could see why. Warden was alone. That broke all the rules even if Megamind was chained up.

But the Warden's glare sent them scurrying away. Once the witnesses were gone, he sighed heavily, "Why?"

"I missed the stars," the blue man quipped back.

"Blue…" the Warden sighed again and slowly and with stiff joints, dropped to sit by his most notorious captive, voice tired and weary, "If just stopped all this nonsense, Blue… it's not too late…"

Megamind ignored the familiar moniker, scowling at the chains on his wrists, "That ship sailed a long time ago."

The silence dragged on after that. Megamind wasn't sure why the Warden was dragging his feet in taking him back to his cell, maybe the Old Man actually felt guilty for the way he'd been treating the blue alien. Either way, Megamind wasn't going to rush it along.

Finally, the Warden stood, a warm and familiar hand on Megamind's shoulder, "It's time."

As Megamind struggled to his feet as bound up as he was, he briefly let his head fall to the Old Man's shoulder. For one brief moment, that soft, warm hand touched the back of his head. The blue alien sighed at the touch, his shoulders relaxing. But no words came out. What was there to even say anymore? They'd already said it all.

And then the moment had passed. They were Megamind and the Warden once more as the path back the Special Cell 9 was retraced. The Warden glared anyone who might question his leading the prisoner into silence. It was unspoken how much the Warden did and didn't do in regards to the blue villain. Any who spoke too loudly were silenced. No information left the prison. No nosy reporters got secret scoops. What little rumors did leave the prison where hushed or discredited.

Alone in his cell again. With his thought.

What time even was it now? His only clue came when the lights were suddenly turned off. Megamind was far too lost into the blankness of not wanting to think. Not wanting the pain of old memories and longings. He should be concerned about whether Minion got his coded message, if anyone else noticed it. What Warden was going to do. About what the next step in his plan was going to be… but he just… couldn't. Every thought spiraled back to what shouldn't, couldn't be remembered. What would only cause his heart to ache with nostalgia for what can never be again.

But when his eyes finally, painfully, fell closed… he dreamt of a soft star covered blanket and warm hands and a gruff but loving voice that once told him stories until he could fall asleep.


End file.
